


Enemy of my Enemy (Part 2)

by Embleer_Frith0323



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon), Young Justice (Comics)
Genre: Batfamily Feels, Cancer Arc, Coping, Disasters, Faeries Made Them Do It, Father-Son Relationship, Fix-It, Gen, Sidhe, Terminal Illnesses, Unseelie Court
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-09
Updated: 2014-08-09
Packaged: 2018-02-12 12:23:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 57,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2109789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Embleer_Frith0323/pseuds/Embleer_Frith0323
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When faced with a growing threat to the globe, Dick Grayson uncovers the cause of the impending disaster and, after remembering the events that led to it, is forced to make a heavy decision to circumvent a worldwide cataclysm.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Enemy of my Enemy (Part 2)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [daisymagick](https://archiveofourown.org/users/daisymagick/gifts).



> This is the second part of this two-part fan fiction. :-)
> 
> A few things... This is written from Dick's point-of-view versus Bruce's, so the narrative is constructed a little differently. I again took a couple of creative liberties and applied some limitations, and put my own spins on a few of the characters and some of the events of old comic canon... hopefully they come off okay! ^_^ 
> 
> I again toiled over medical accuracy, and would like to take a second to thank those who provided help during my research. :-) 
> 
> To the creators of Regular Ordinary Swedish Mealtime--hope you don't mind I mentioned you. :-) 
> 
> The quote at the end of (and referred to part-way through) this piece is from John Donne's Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, originally published in 1624. 
> 
> The other quote ("The things we fear the most have already happened to us") is borrowed from Deepak Chopra's Path to Love, published in 1998.
> 
> I originally didn't have any intention of writing beyond what comprised the first part of this fan fiction, but I found, when I finished the first part, that I wanted to explore Dick's experience/side of things a bit. :-) Hopefully it's on par with Part 1 and isn't like the standard sequel that ruins the original. ;-)
> 
> Finally, I hope that you enjoy and, again, that it isn't insufferable to read! ^_^
> 
> (Annnnd I also fixed my misunderstood category. Forgive me as I chuckle over my silliness.) :-)

“You know, I keep getting the feeling that my father sent me here just to get _babysat_.”

I look up from the completely out-of-place notches in the modified bitumen, and shrug. Damian gives me a decidedly petulant look. _Surprise, surprise…_ I return my attention to the gashes in the otherwise flat, seamless surface of the rooftop. 

“I am being _serious_ , Nightwing—there is not a single trace of Intergang here, or for that matter, anywhere. And there hasn’t been for weeks. Whatever it is that they scheme, it is hardly an active plan.”

“I agree,” I say dismissively. “Still, we’re obviously capable of missing obvious clues. Let’s keep looking.”

Damian wrinkles his nose, and crosses his arms. “You _obviously_ need a new mantra. You are _obviously_ capable of being _obviously_ misled.”

I look up, and crack a half-smile. “ _Obviously._ Check this out.”

Damian kneels down beside me, and appraises the nicks in the bitumen surface. He looks up at me, an eyebrow arched. 

“These don’t seem to be anything more out of the ordinary than common hail damage,” he sniffs. 

“Oh, come on. I _know_ you’re smarter than that. You know, getting primed to lead humanity and all that…”

“Don’t mockme,” he snaps.

I hold up conciliatory hands and give him a look of total innocence.

“I would never,” I fib. “But seriously. Take a closer look.”

Damian glowers at me a moment more, then focuses on the rivets. 

“Now that you mention it, they look… rather like the indentations left by the simplistic grappling hooks favored by the ignoramuses that comprise Intergang,” he concedes.

“Gold star goes to Detective Damian,” I proclaim, running a scan over the marks. “You know, that kind of has a ring to it… Got anything else you want to add to that assessment?”

“Yes, I recognize my error… If it was hail damage, it would affect the entirety of the roof, not just two localized spots.”

“Excellent sleuthing, Watson,” I say. 

“Does this mean I get a treat of some kind?” Damian asks, apparently— _Finally—_ loosening up.

“What, gold star’s not enough?” I smile with satisfaction when the scan picks up traces of the steel fibers commonly shed when the force of a rudimentary grappling hook’s propulsion strips the line as it passes through the casing. I point out the scan’s findings to Damian. “That clinches it.”

“I am _not_ talking about a gold star,” says Damian, “or about steel fibers embedded in grappling hook landing sites.”

“Naturally,” I say. “Take a gander, here—simplistic grappling hook, like you said, and one that’s pretty crappily constructed. Who do you think we’re dealing with?”

“Promise me a repast after we trace this back to The Groom and I’ll tell you more.”

“Deal,” I tell him. I check the time. “Oh, perfect. Just after eight as we speak. Half-price shakes. Although I’ll have to grab one for Batgirl or she’ll never forgive me. You in?”

“Yes. You have clearly come to understand my vices, Nightwing.”

I tap my temple. “Detective… Oh, and Mathlete, come to think of it. Elementary, my friend. Speaking of that, keep your eye on the prize here, Watson.”

“Of course, _Holmes_ ,” Damian says. “Why are _you_ Holmes?”

“Because I outrank you, that’s why. Anyway. What can you tell me about The Groom?”

“Elementary, Holmes. ‘The Groom’ is, _obviously,_ merely an alias—his actual civilian name is Thomas Larson. He is what might be loosely referred to as a psychopathic criminal, he is married to Violet Parris, and they fancy themselves to be something of a modern-day Bonnie and Clyde, calling themselves The Bride and Groom.”

“Impressive. Watson, your skills of observation and retention continue to improve. And when were they initiated into Intergang…?”

“Just last Tuesday.”

“For that, your shake gets super-sized.”

“You are far too quick to reward.”

“Well, I’m not Psycho-Mom, here,” I remind him. He narrows his eyes at me from behind the black domino mask, and I grin happily in response. “Anyhow. Let’s see where they headed next…”

I run the scan, checking for more grappling hook notches in the surrounding buildings. Bingo. Right across the way. I love tracking dumbass criminals. 

“All right,” I say, hopping to. “Per the norm, they didn’t exactly cover their tracks. Let’s move.”

Then, suddenly, my communicator buzzes in my ear. I draw up short, and hold out an arm to stall Damian’s motions. 

“Nightwing,” I say, repositioning the pod to enable less muffled audio.

“It’s Batman,” comes Bruce’s familiar voice over the comm. “Whatever it is you’re doing, drop it.”

“Uh, not sure we can? Robin and I are chasing a lead on The Bride and Groom,” I tell him.

“Drop it,” he states in his No-Bullshit Voice.

“Why? What’s up?”

“…It’s time we talk.”

I pause. 

“Oookay. What about?” I ask. 

“ _Nightwing,”_ he hisses.

“All right, fine. When and where?”

“Bat Cave, ten minutes.”

I turn to Damian, who’s eyeing me with his arms crossed and one eyebrow cocked. 

“Sorry, dude,” I tell him. “Looks like I owe you a milkshake.”

“What’s going on?”

“Well,” I say, “your dad just dropped the dreaded ‘we need to talk’ bomb on me.”

“That happened a little earlier than I expected,” Damian says with a smug look.

I raise a brow at him. “You _knew_ this was coming?”

“Well, I didn’t know about The Bride and Groom, but I knew that my father wished to have an exceptionally in-depth conversation with you sometime later.”

“Great,” I say, unceremoniously gathering Damian up as a form of vengeance and launching via grappling hook to the ground below. I dump him on his feet. “Am I in trouble?”

“I wouldn’t say _you_ are…” he giggles nastily. “How do you put it, the ‘aster’ won’t be felt this time.”

I frown. “All right, then…” 

I’m really hoping this won’t be the tenth lecture I’ve had in as many days regarding dragging my feet and manning the eff up regarding Babs, but Bruce has never pestered me (or her) about whether or not we plan on tying the knot any time soon, so I guess I probably shouldn’t worry too much. Granted, when Bruce decides he wants to talk about something, it’s usually a Pretty Serious Something. I’m not entirely sure if my venant or denture or whatever you’d like to call it in prolonging this engagement constitutes a Pretty Serious Something, but who knows. I mull this over as Damian and I Zeta Tube to the Bat Cave. 

Upon entering, I see that Bruce, with a customary cup of coffee, is seated on one of the chairs in front of the myriad touch screens that conduct maybe four thousand percent of Batman Business on a daily basis. The armored mask is pulled back from his face, which is drawn and haggard—more so than usual. 

Come to think of it, he’s really been showing his age more in recent months. While I’m well aware that he’s getting older, it’s disconcerting to actually _see_ the effects of aging in the crow’s feet around his eyes, and the smattering of gray hairs steadily unfurling at his temples. It seems to have come on suddenly—and I wonder about what happened after that helicopter crash some months ago to stress him to such an immense degree that he’s abruptly wrinkling and going gray.

(Only father I have at this point—don’t fault me for not really wanting to accept that he’s not indestructible or immortal.)

“Damian,” says Bruce in a flat tone, “unsuit and head up to the manor. As we discussed, I need to talk this over with Dick, alone.”

“Very well, Father,” Damian says, almost sounding triumphant. I watch as he exits into a changing room, and then look askance over at Bruce. 

“Okay…” I mutter, then sit down in the chair opposite him. “So what’s up, Doc?”

“In a second.” He stares levelly at me. To anyone else, he might appear to be unruffled or unconcerned, but I know him well enough now to interpret his carefully schooled features as just that—carefully schooled. I feel like I’m under a microscope suddenly, and run a hand through my hair. It occurs to me I might be overdue for a haircut (whatever _that_ is.) Damian slowly wanders by, exaggerating each step, until he finally vanishes through the door that opens up into the lift that leads to the library. I turn my attention back to Bruce.

“Out with it,” I say, folding my arms over my chest and rocking the seat. 

“You may want some coffee first.”

“Not to quote your boyfriend or anything, but _why so serious?_ Should I chase it with a bottle of scotch?”

“Please don’t joke.”

I shrug, rise, and pour myself a cup of coffee. I add my preferred portion of sugar (the real stuff, rock sugar, not that fake sweetener poison or white bread granulated crap) and return to my chair. 

“Okay,” I say. “You’ve stalled long enough. What’s going on?”

“Well,” he says, “I stalled more for your sake than mine.”

I glower at him. “Oh, come on.”

There is one more pause, during which I pointedly sip my coffee, then lower it with a flourish.

“First of all,” says Bruce finally, drawing up an image of what appears to be a Council gathering in Themascyra. “As you can see, the Amazonians are presently convening in Themyscira to discuss a particular threat.”

I nod. “Okay. What’s the threat?”

“It’s not a what. It’s a ‘who.’ And it is one being.”

“All right, then, who’s the threat?”

“Her name is Mab.”

I lift my eyebrows. “Uh… As in… _A Midsummer Night’s Dream_ Mab?”

“The same. Only… you might not have gained a proper understanding of the Queen of Air and Darkness from that text.”

“Hmm.” I scratch at my stubble and figure if I’m bothering to get my hair cut, I should probably shave while I’m at it. “Go on.” 

“You know her as Mabel.”

I stare at him. “Wait… as in… _Zatanna’s_ Mabel?”

“Yes.”

By now, my jaw seems to remember—chronically—that it’s comprised of two parts, and as such, wants to show this knowledge to the world by falling open and staying that way. “So… Zatanna’s bestie is a _fairy?_ This… Queen of Air and Darkness? Mab? Not just some girl friend named Mabel?”

“That’s correct.”

“…Wow,” I mutter, and pass a hand over my face. Weirdness is part of the job, but this one is pretty new. “So how is Mabel… er, Mab, sorry, a threat to the Amazons?”

Bruce turns, and brings up a scanned-in image of what appears to be a scroll, which bears an illustration of violent warfare, punctuated by text in Greek. Working for years beside two Amazonian women, I’ve since taken up a reasonable understanding of the language, and am skimming the text even as Bruce begins to speak.

“Well, several thousand years ago, a huge skirmish between the Amazons and the Titan gods resulted in Hippolyta requesting a favor of Queen Titania of the Sidhe, or Good Folk, as they are often otherwise known. Titania promised that she would overthrow the Titan gods… but only providing that Hippolyta give over her daughter, Diana, then merely a child, for her to keep, and raise, as a Changeling girl.”

“Diana… as in _our_ Diana? Wonder Woman?”

“Yes.” 

I lean forward, forgetting the cup of coffee. Bruce brings up another scanned-in scroll, this one presenting an old-style illustration of a woman kneeling, as though begging, in front of a resplendent queen. 

“Naturally,” Bruce continues, “Hippolyta, before long, became distressed and overwhelmed with compunction over the bargain, although the Sidhe had already banished the Titan gods and sealed them within the pit of Tartarus, thereby saving the Amazons from certain destruction. However, when pressed, she continued to refuse to give over her beloved daughter, even threatening to use force against the Sidhe if Titania tried to take the girl. Angered by this, Queen Titania’s younger sister, Mab, then known as the Princess of Wind and Ice, took matters into her own hands.”

I nod, frowning. “What’d she do?”

Bruce gives me a dark, steady stare. “She cast a permanent winter night over the entirety of Amazon, froze the whole of the palace in Themyscira—killing hundreds of Amazonian noblewomen—and cast a breath of frost into Hippolyta’s body, an action that would slowly kill her from the inside out. Mab then, in keeping with seeing the bargain through, snatched Diana from her bed, and stole her away to the Unseelie Realm.”

The next image is an illustration of an edifice swallowed in ice, encasing several unfortunate victims, their mouths agape, their arms outstretched helplessly. The fields beyond are depicted to be equally choked with ice, sprinkled with dead animals and Amazons.

I sit back. “…Damn.”

“Yes. Queen Titania, wishing to avoid war with Amazon, and willing to show mercy to Hippolyta, was proportionately horrified by what her sister had done, and to appease the Amazons, she returned the light of summer to their realm, healed Hippolyta of her affliction, returned Diana to Themyscira, and banished Mab to the land that is known as Talamh Reoite, or “Frozen Land,” which, although she rules over this realm as Queen, served—and still serves—as her prison… and a prison for all others of the Unseelie that have been banished from the realm of the Sidhe.” Bruce chases the images from the screen. “In return for their service, Amazon offered to them the Pegasus, and promised never to trouble the Good Folk again.”

“…Jeez.”

“Although the accord was reached, there is substantial bad blood between the two. And, naturally, the Amazons are particularly wary of Mab.”

“Well, yeah.” I drum my fingers a bit on my coffee cup. “Okay. So stop me if I’m misunderstanding something somewhere. If Mab is supposed to be held up in this ‘Frozen Land’ or ‘Talamh Reoite’ or whatever, how is she able to travel to this realm as Mabel?”

“For a time, she was under Zatanna’s sway while in this dimension.”

“What gave Zatanna authority over her?”

“It is part of the essence of the spells that bind Mab within her prison—she would first have to be invited out of Talamh Reoite by a mortal, and then, while in this realm, she would have no true autonomy. Whatever mortal drew her out of her prison by a willing solicitation would hold all dominion over her. She wouldn’t have been able to sneeze without Zatanna’s permission.”

“Why did Zatanna invite her out in the first place?”

“Zatanna wasn’t the only one who invited her out.”

“Okay… so who else did?”

He looks at me. “I did.”

Silence. I stare, flattened. It’s _really_ not like Bruce to invite a dangerous wild card like Mab out of some icy, supernatural penitentiary, even with good reason. “Why?”

“We’ll get to that. For now, let’s discuss Mab, and how her status as prisoner has changed to that of fugitive.”

“I take it she escaped Talamh Reoite?” I observe. “And that’s how she’s now threatening Amazon?”

“Yes,” says Bruce. He sighs heavily. “Might as well get to it now. The truth is… it’s my fault.”

I incline my head, confused, and am quiet a moment. 

“…How is this your fault?” I query.

He holds my gaze, steady and inscrutable. 

“…I made a bargain with Mab,” he says, his voice slow, measured, loaded with meaning, “a little over twelve years ago. It was only after I sustained the injuries in the helicopter explosion, and I lay, immobile, and unable to refuse, that she came to me, requesting her own favor in return for the service that she did me, all those years ago.”

 _A little over twelve years ago. Twelve years…_ Trepidation worms through my body, a plague, a disease. 

“What was the bargain?” I ask, my voice measured with equal care. 

He continues to gaze at me. “Do you need to ask?”

My heart is starting to hammer, but I don’t let this show. I shake my head. “I want to hear it from you.”

“…I promised her a service in return for restoring you to health,” he says, no longer steeling his voice. He heaves another sigh, and I see his teeth clenching in the light from the touch screens beside us. “She… eradicated your cancer, and I, in return, provided to her the use of Hawk Woman’s mace. Mab, after having me solicit the aid of unwitting Atlantian sorcerers to infuse the mace with further power, then had me use it to eradicate all binding spells that have been placed on her, that have kept her inside Talamh Reoite, and that have held her under the sway of Zatanna, and of myself, for all this time. She used me, through my end of the bargain that I was bound to uphold, to attain her freedom.”

I sit in complete and utter silence and stare at him, all of the realizations that come with this earthshattering confession screaming loudly, overwhelmingly in my brain. 

“What her newfound freedom indicates, I can’t be completely certain,” Bruce says. “It could be that she wishes vengeance on the Amazons, if she traces blame for what has become of her back to them, or it could be that she wishes revenge on her own sister, for exiling her from their home and disowning her those several thousand years ago. Or, maybe… all she truly desires is freedom, in and of itself, even if that freedom is bought in a fugitive state. But… Whatever it is she might want, the Amazons are readying themselves to move in on this realm. They are going to invade our dimension, and _find_ Mab, at _all_ costs, even if those costs include massive loss of human life, if there is any resistance they encounter.”

“…Jesus. Bruce.”

“I entered into the bargain fully understanding that Mab’s favor may be a little… astronomical?” He grimaces. “So, I ensured various counter-measures that might minimize any damage. Queen Titania has been informed of her sister’s actions, Hawk Woman has had her weapon returned to her and I immediately provided her information with regard to why her mace was stolen, and I’ve informed the League of the situation. They’re prepared to defend this realm as necessary.”

“Do they know about your hand in this whole thing?”

“Not yet.”

“But… it’s only a matter of time.”

“I’d say that’s a fair assessment.

I press a hand to my face, suddenly feeling sick. “You mean to tell me… that… the only reason I got better… was because you made some sort of Faustian _pact_ with some fairy queen from another world?”

Bruce nods. “Yes.”

I stare at him. “What?”

“I know it might seem hard to believe, Dick. But… I’ll tell you right now that I would do it again.”

I shake my head, incredulous. _“What?”_

I, honestly, find myself hopelessly at a loss for further words, or even for belief, or for any semblance of processing. That Batman, who is eternally willing to sacrifice absolutely everything for the sake of his mission, risked literally the whole of _humanity_ —that is to say, his mission, and really, in the end, equally sacrificed _himself_ —just for the sake of my comparatively stupid life is dizzyingly unreal. The only real thought that yells louder than all of the others is that I find myself wishing that he’d just let me go, when the time had come, instead of doing… _this._

As always, Bruce seems to know what I’m thinking, before I’ve even said a word. 

“You weren’t _going_ to die in the end, Dick, and you were going to leave a body count,” he snaps. “Don’t even try to tell me you’d accept having _that_ hanging over your head for the rest of your life.”

I stare at him. “I couldn’t even _blink_ without help. How the hell was I going to leave a body count?”

Bruce’s face is somber, dark. “You’re familiar with Zatanna’s abilities. She made an almost successful effort to cast a spell of healing over you.”

My heart sinks, and takes my stomach with it as it makes a rapid descent to the floor. “…No.”

“Yes. She did,” he continues, even as I shake my head. “Kaldur and I made it in time to interrupt the spell. Eventually, though, realizing that there would be no talking her down from the course of action that she had decided on, I offered Zatanna the recourse of the Sidhe, and we agreed to beseech the Good Folk together.”

“Zatanna was in on it?”

“She went willingly, Dick. That aside, I needed her to open the portal into the Unseelie Realm.”

I pass my hands over my face. “All this time… I believed it was some experimental miracle drug…”

“I’m sorry,” Bruce says.

I lower my hands. “You know, this explains a hell of a lot. Why you’ve _never_ wanted to discuss this mysterious ‘miracle drug.’ Why you’d lock up every time I tried to talk to you about whether or not it had been tried on the slew of others who’ve needed it since. Why you’d skirt the subject when I’d bring it up. Why you couldn’t even _name_ the damn thing—it didn’t even exist!”

“It was better for you not to know.”

“Oh, that’s crap, and you know it,” I snap.

“Well, that aside,” Bruce says, “I dwelled on it all too often when you were sick—that there wouldn’t be a League, or a Team, if not for you—”

“Way to forget all the help I had,” I interrupt. “Ravager, Wolf and Sphere ring any bells? Hell, even Deathstroke. I didn’t do _any_ of that by myself.”

“It was your plan. And they were under your guidance. You deserved better than what you received.”

“Bruce, doesn’t everyone? Granted, more psycho criminals have a tendency to skirt through life all facile-like than is even remotely fair, and yes, if 'disfacile' is the opposite of facile, then, arguably, life should be a _lot_ more disfacile for them, but that’s not usually how it goes. Don’t forget that billionaire asshole in Texas who murdered his stepdaughter beyond a reasonable doubt buying his way out of it to wind up sitting pretty, free as a bird, and finding the Lord. Life doesn’t always give a damn about what you deserve or what you’ve done.”

Bruce leans a hand against his forehead, and in this moment, looks older and more exhausted than ever. It’s a piercing sight. 

“Dick…” he murmurs. “Have you already forgotten what you went through? Back then?”

I feel my fists clenching.

“That’s not really something you forget, Bruce,” I say. 

The truth is, I _still_ have nightmares, once in a while, about those hellish days I spent locked in the Battle of the Bulge, as Babs now calls it. I’m also stuck seeing the oncologist at least every year to get PET scans and blood work and lumbar punctures and all kinds of crap to ensure that I’m still NEC. Every appointment I swear takes a year off my cancer-free life. 

Bruce eyes me, not speaking for a moment. Finally, he breaks the quiet. “Then let me ask you something. Is it really so hard for you to understand my decision?”

I, again, lose all ability to speak, and remember his words, all those years ago.

 _I needed you. I_ need _you_ now _._

“…I need a minute,” I mutter, and rise to my feet. “Or… a day.”

Bruce says nothing, merely nods as I, half-planning to go home, stalk off to the Bludhaven Zeta Tube.

I enter the Team’s warehouse in the city through the transporter. Given that the place is now really just a glorified storage unit, no one’s there. Small favors from above—I won’t encounter anyone, and be forced into explaining why I resemble a ghost scared by its own shadow. 

I’m not sure if I’m ready to head home quite yet after all, so, to clear my head, I unsuit, change into civvies, and head out into the night. It’s cold, bitterly so. The freezing air is rather like a shock of water to the face, and the sensation clears my wheeling brain just enough to allow a slower-paced, semi-linear marching band formation of thoughts to travel through its shaken mindscape with a better sense of order. I head to the pier, the dusting of snow across the splintery wooden planks a scattered rainbow glittering in the Christmas lights, and I lean against the railing. Gazing out over the surface of the water, I see my breath, no longer the pathetic mini-huffs of carbon dioxide manufactured from the broken oxygen converter that my body once was, as it condenses into little sugarpuffs on the chill air.

Time to relive the Battle of the Bulge, I realize, and recall Bruce’s role in the whole thing. 

I haven’t actually gone through all of the events in their specific details in years. But I remember the day, at this point going on thirteen years ago, that I could no longer deny that something was seriously wrong with me down to even the most minute details. I can tell you exactly how my sheets smelled upon waking—like lavender and chamomile, courtesy of the scented spray that Babs said would have a “calming-slash-relaxing” effect on even my inexorable energy levels, how the light lazily sneaked in through my window—a draining, tired, not-enough-sleep indigo blue, and how I registered what, exactly, woke me up in the first place—the sense that my stomach was eating itself from the inside out. I sat up, and gasped, my breathing stalling in my throat. The whole of my abdomen was a sharp, devouring pain, full of disembodied jaws with serrated, acid-coated teeth racing Pac-Man-style through my innards. I pressed the flats of both arms against the discomfort, and concentrated my breathing the best that I could, as both Bruce and Dinah had taught me to when in pain. 

It had been bothering me for some time, now, my stomach, just not quite this badly. I slowly relaxed, channeling the pain the best I could. I passed my hands over my face. The cloying fatigue that stubbornly refused to give me a break from experiencing firsthand the not-life of a zombie was still there, and still annoying as hell. My head spun and my limbs felt flush and wobbly. Swinging my legs out of bed, I paused.

Both legs, illuminated pale blue in the light from the window, were covered in marks, little, dark, pepperoni-looking things that made me wonder for a moment if I had bed bugs that had happily gorged themselves on my blood via my exposed calves all night. Inwardly, though, I knew that wasn’t the problem. I felt achy all the way through my muscles and into my bones. Last I checked, bed bug bites don’t give you inexplicable bone and muscle pain. 

“Aw, goddammit,” I muttered, leaving my face in my hands for a second. Whether I wanted to or not, it was probably time to see a doctor. Either way, I decided I wasn’t breathing a word of it to anyone. 

I had just finished exams the week before, so I had absolutely nowhere to be for a while, providing that no one from the Team called about some crisis or another. I got up, got some coffee going, and sat with a thump at the barstool to boot up my laptop so I could seek out a physician. I hardly ever had medical intervention outside of the med-labs at headquarters, and really didn’t even have a primary care physician at that point. I supposed I could call Alfred, and I knew he would keep it on the DL if I asked him to, but Bruce was a total snoop. I had a snowball’s chance in hell of getting something like this past him, and I knew he’d have the Batman equivalent of a conniption over it if he found me out. No, thanks. It was a Thursday, and unlikely that I would even get an appointment until next week. Part of me wondered if I needed to go to the ER, but I dismissed the thought with some derision and poured a cup of coffee.

 _Okay. I need to be insoucient. Get_ way _less soucient_ , I told myself, sugaring the coffee and sitting back down. _Keep thinking insoucient thoughts… It can’t be_ that _serious…_

Right as I settled on a doctor who ran a practice up the street from my apartment, a call came over the Team communicator. I bit back a sigh, and checked it.

It was Oracle—Barbara—calling. I really didn’t feel like talking to her, even if it was for Team business. I considered not answering, but I knew I’d get written up if I missed a page. I hit the respond key.

“Yeah?” I said, pinching the bridge of my nose. My entire head throbbed.

“There’s a crisis in Central City,” said Babs. “Can you get to the Watchtower in two?”

“Would it be a big problem if I begged off? I’ve got some personal business.”

“Um, yeah,” she said flatly. “Kind of a big thing we’ve got going on here.”

“Sounds riveting,” I said irritably.

“Disgruntled much? What’s your problem?” she said. 

“I am _not_ disgruntled,” I snapped. “I’m positively _gruntled_ , thank you very much. See you in two.”

I ducked out to the warehouse, suited up, and Zeta’ed to the Watchtower. Kaldur ran over the crisis itself, governed which squads were which, and determined me to be field leader of Beta. As he turned to leave, a call from Batman came over the video comm. I responded, allowing Kaldur to head out with his squad to head to Central City.

“Icicle Junior just shifted his position to Smallville,” Bruce said. “As leader of Beta squad, it’s there you’ll be focusing your attention. Their goal is to freeze and destroy the crops there—your goal is to keep them from doing so, and also to ascertain their purposes behind destroying the crops. Likely, it’s a diversion, but then again, any of the related crises that keep cropping up could equally be red herrings intended to direct our attention away from their primary mission. Be sure to communicate this to Aqualad—”

As he said this last, there was a slight tingling in my nose, and then a shock of warm, gushing wetness as I had a pretty spectacular nosebleed that poured all the way down to my chest before I could even lift a hand. 

It was the third in barely as many weeks, but this one really trounced all—the blood seeped between my fingers even as I clapped a hand over my mouth, pressing my knuckles to my bleeding nostrils. 

“Call you back,” I said, and cut the call short. I sprinted to one of the bathrooms before I compiled any eye witnesses and with clumsy violence yanked half the roll of paper towels out of the dispenser. I mashed them up, tipped my head back, and jammed the entire wadded mass of crinkly, rough, scratchy paper to my face. My head pounded. My stomach seemed to have become home to an enormous sandbag. I was paranormally bone-tired, which made no sense—I had turned in the night before at about nine, right after going over the results of tampering with the home network of one of Luthor’s less-suspecting employees with Babs, and had slept heavily and dreamlessly for almost ten hours. 

The conversation in question with Babs had really sucked. While it started with some nerd talk about hacking Lex-Corp-specific intrusion detection systems, it had ended in a big, stupid fight. Barbara and I had broken up right after Easter, a few weeks prior to this point, and it was _not_ because I’d wanted to, or was okay with it, or due to any lack of fighting on my end. Even worse, she was shaping up to be the only ex I would never be real friends with again, if things kept going in the direction that they were.

I mentioned to Babs that the bug had been anonymously, untraceably, and successfully installed on the guy’s personal cell phone, and that it should grant us plenty of access to Lex-Corps’ nigh-impenetrable network if the dude happened to be as unsuspecting as we suspected, and unsuspectingly plugged the phone into his equally unsuspecting work machine. Babs had nodded, marking something in her computer, and then, smiling, she had handed me her smartphone from her pocket.

“Check out the last picture on the photo stream,” she said. 

I obeyed, and smiled when I brought up the photo—a cat.

When Barbara had moved back in with her parents following her release from the hospital after the gunshot wound that cost her the use of her legs, I had, once I consulted with her mother, brought her a kitten to cheer her up. I’d first considered a dog, but cats generally require a little less effort regarding basic needs, and she had enough adjusting to do. Babs was ambivalent about cats and I hoped she wouldn’t freak out at me when I showed up with a random “oh hey here’s a cute fluffy thing hope it makes you feel better” gift. Knowing that, if I approached her about it first, she’d probably have nothing to do with the idea, and ignoring my brain’s own variety of arguments against it, I headed to the animal shelter, selected an appropriately cute, long-haired, tortoiseshell kitten, filled out the attendant paperwork, got the little gal spayed, and then brought her over to Babs. 

In the brief interim that I had the kitten, I had taken to calling her Foxy Lady, given that she had a big, poofy, bottle-brush fox tail even in her fuzzy-haired kittenhood (and I’m a bit of a Hendrix fan.) I decided also that maybe I was more of a cat person than I originally suspected. She was a very sweet, playful, affectionate thing, with a purr that I swear rattled the blinds. She endlessly curled up beside me to sleep, and even when I shifted positions, she would migrate over to ensure that she was always sprawled out across me in some way. When I was home, she followed me all over the apartment with her floofy tail and spirits held banner-high, and then she would perch beside me, watching with interest as I worked or studied, or she would sack out on my lap or shoulder while I read or watched TV. I was thankful that Babs and I at least were engaged at the time, and I wouldn’t really be giving up the cat when I brought her over to the Gordons’ residence. 

Babs fell head-over-heels for the kitten instantly, bursting into elated tears, smothering Foxy in kisses, and hugging her little, furry body to her cheek. She laughed through her happy, tearful cooing over the cat when I mentioned what I’d started calling her, and Foxy Lady became her official full name. 

In the photo I now looked at, Foxy was all curled up on her back, her paw wrapped around the little mini teddy bear that Babs had purchased for her immediately after I brought her over. Both cat and teddy bear were snuggled into the Babs’ lap. Impulsively, I thumbed through the roll, figuring that there were more photos where this one came from. Yeah, yeah, I know I shouldn’t have just gone flipping through Babs’ photo stream, but cut me some slack—I missed my cat.

I paused when I came across a picture of Foxy snuggled against the thigh of some dude I hadn’t seen before. Which, granted, really shouldn’t have been a big deal—I mean, Babs has always had friends outside of the Team who were clueless about her identity as both Batgirl and Oracle and everything, but something about this photo of some complete stranger getting cozy with my cat bugged me. Already feeling pretty achy and under the weather, my stomach lurched as I paused on the image. I felt an itch to banish the picture, pretend I hadn’t seen it, and hand Babs back her phone; however, my thumb and brain suddenly decided to go incommunicado, and I involuntarily scrutinized the picture as though I were some mad microbiologist arrested at his microscope by the appearance of some new brand of particularly nasty bug. The guy had a nice enough smile (I guessed), crinkly brown eyes that appeared kind-ish and nice-ish (I guessed), but he sported just about the best shaven pate and douchebag beard combination I’d ever seen (this last I _didn’t_ guess.)

“Who’s this guy?” I asked, keeping my voice friendly. 

Babs looked up, taking in the picture as I presented it to her. “Oh, him? Umm… my boyfriend. Stephen.” She paused, then swiped her phone out of my hand. “Why were you going through my photos, anyway?” 

“Oh, uh—sorry. Just looking for more pictures of Foxy,” I said awkwardly, already recognizing my error and feeling like a jackass. 

“Mm-hmm.” She blushed furiously and pocketed her phone.

“So… Boyfriend?” I acted nonchalant, but in reality, I felt chalant. _Way, way_ chalant. 

Babs sighed and looked up at me with a slightly helpless expression, still flushed. “Yeah, umm… Yeah.” She shoved her work tablet into the bag that hung off of the arm of her chair, then adopted a look of cheer. “I’m officially seeing someone… Buuuut I don’t know him all that well quite yet.” She drummed her fingers on the arms of her chair.

“Oh. Well… that’s cool,” I said, affecting calm. Outwardly, I smiled at her. Inwardly, I decided that if this New Boyfriend Stephen so much as laid a hand on Foxy again, I’d chuck him out a third-story window. _Let’s see how the douchebag beard works for you then, dipshit._

Babs smiled, relaxing visibly in her chair. “Really? I’m glad you think so…”

That got me. I was (still am) a fairly decent actor, sure—I mean, in the job it’s kind of a required skill, but good Lord. Babs should have known me better, and I felt oddly hurt that she wasn’t at least a _little_ upset that I wasn’t overtly jealous.

“Sure,” I lied. “I mean… does this Stephen dude make you happy?”

“Uh, yes? Well… at least enough to make things exclusive.”

“Okay, then that’s enough for me,” I said, and although it stung, I meant it. 

“Well, thanks. Um…” She sighed, and looked up at me, cute as ever with her new, punky-short haircut and Weezer glasses. I felt a twinge, somewhere, that didn’t feel like a symptom of whatever flu I thought I had. “Look. I know I should have said something, I just… I don’t know. I’m really sorry I didn’t tell you about Stephen right away.”

I felt my chest go hot, all sorts of uncomfortable feelings igniting the pilot light in my moiling belly. I frowned at her, but let my disposition remain as outwardly tranquil as I could. “Right away? How long have you been seeing him?”

She shrugged casually. “Eh, I don’t know. Maybe three weeks or so.”

I stared at her, finally giving into a case of the Oh-Screw-Its and dropping the act. “Wow… want to let your sheets cool down a bit, maybe? I mean, jeez, Babs—we broke up what, a _month_ ago?”

She gave me a primly arched brow. “Your point?”

“Oh, gee, I don’t know, maybe something about the timeline isn’t sitting right? Did Stephen Douchebag Beard have anything to do with you and me breaking up in the first place?”

“Oh, please,” she huffed. “That’s pretty rich coming from you, anyway.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

She went bolt upright in her chair, her cheeks reddening, the flush spreading to her ears. Meaning she was pissed. “Oh, give me a _break._ We all know you’re a womanizing prick. You know what, on that subject, I’m going to ask you a _really_ serious question, here—how many crusty skanks have you been poking since we broke up, Dick? Ball park it. Ten? Twenty?”

“Uh, try zero? I haven’t even _looked_ at another girl,” I said—a statement that was completely truthful. 

“Which means thirty at least.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I muttered, the ever-present pain in my head and stomach increasing. I was too exhausted to keep arguing. My brain felt like it was folding in on itself. I threw my hands up. “You know what? I’ve already explained this to you a thousand times. If you want to contort things in your head to push me away so you can go on feeling sorry for yourself, fine, be my guest. Let Captain Douchebag Beard indulge your pity party all he wants, but tell him to stay the hell away from my cat.”

As I turned to head to the Zeta Tubes, she yelled after me.

“First of all, she’s _my_ cat, and second of all, if you plan on acting like this, then we’re strictly business from here on out— _don’t_ call me.”

“Yeah, I’d sooner die,” I snapped, and left. 

And now, standing in the bathroom with the paper towels over my face as I recalled those damning words, something truly foreboding and nameless come over me—some instinctive thing, whispering that I was in serious trouble. My hand, clutching the napkins, started to shake as the blood just kept coming, pouring down my chin, dripping onto my neck and spattering the front of my chest. I kept my head back, and concentrated my breathing through my mouth— _In, out. In, out. Relax._

The nosebleeds had started maybe a month and a half ago, following a few weeks of just feeling generally sub-par, i.e. inexplicably tired, disinterested in food, and achy, all of which I attributed to general overworked type things and then the break-up. I woke up one night stretched out on my stomach, my cheek sinking into a wet stretch of pillowcase. I assumed the soaked cotton beneath my face was the result of exhausted drooling, and, thirsty, I flipped on the light to get up. Rising, I paused, and stared. 

My sheets, kind of a pearly white cotton and lit up opaline beneath the lamp, were blurred by a broad, red shadow. For a groggy second, I thought a corner of the burgundy duvet had meandered up to the pillows and I had slept on it. When the image came into clearer focus, I jerked fully awake. 

Blood vividly bloomed like a giant, nascent poppy blossom over the white pillowcase and sheets beneath. Disconcerted, I looked down at myself, seeking the source of the bleeding, and drew up short when I felt the blood, hot and viscous, trickle from my nostrils and over my upper lip. I pressed a hand to my face, got out of bed and hurried to the bathroom.

When I looked in the mirror, I started—I resembled, with all seriousness, a beleaguered ghoul from some dismal fable. My hair appeared darker than pitch against my bloodless, sallow skin. The only color in my face was in the muddled, smoky smudges beneath my eyes, which glimmered inhumanly bright and glassy. My cheek was coated in a dark, sticky mass of blood that spread to my neck and shoulder and smeared my bare chest. My nose still bled even as I took in the whole gory scene. 

“What the hell…” I muttered, reaching for the hand towel that hung on the bar behind me. I pressed it against my nose and got the shower water running. 

The bleeding stopped eventually, but not after words like “hospital” and “doctor” had flitted briefly through my brain. Standing beneath the jet of hot water, scrubbing the blood from my skin and watching it disappear into the drain, I slowly began to relax as the last swirls of red were swallowed away. I had been roughed up on the field frequently in the days preceding this first nosebleed—I decided there was nothing more to it than some delayed symptom of getting clocked in the face, and let go of my prior misgivings, feeling now pretty silly about my initial worry.

The disquiet returned when I had another nosebleed—equally severe—several days later, then another maybe two weeks following, and still another some time after. Each one seemed to be on a quest to trump the last. And like I said, this one that hit me in the Watchtower was, by a long shot, the worst. 

In the bathroom, I felt increasingly light-headed, and through the little sparklers blinking in my vision, saw that the blood had soaked through the huge wad of paper towels and was now dripping onto the floor. My stomach pulled into a crunchingly tight fist even as my arms and legs transmutated into gelatin. I pulled some more paper towels out of the dispenser with a trembling hand, replaced the first crumpled, blood-soaked mass with this new one, and with a thunk, leaned my back against the wall. In that exact moment, I doubted anything could have pulled me out of that bathroom. 

Just as the bleeding slowed and I started to slowly pull it together, the door to the bathroom swung open, as though in a bid to prove my feelings wrong. I ducked into the nearest stall. 

“Hey, man, we gotta go. You okay, ese?” came the voice of Jaime through the door. 

“Fine,” I lied, still bleeding, still hurting, still weak and faint. “You’d better get moving, Blue—I’ll catch up to you guys later.”

“Que demonios… There’s blood on the floor here—you sure you’re all right?” 

I stifled a curse. “I’m fine—just dealing with a pain in the ass cut. Don’t lose Icicle.”

“Will you shut up for one second?” Jaime said in a hushed voice. “Sorry, sorry. Not you, Nightwing. Scarab, you know how it goes.”

“Yeah. Look, Blue, I’m serious—grab Beta and move. You’re squad leader until I catch up.”

“What? Uh, si, all right. …You sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m good. Seriously, hurry up.”

I heard him leave, and, gathering myself, I slowly, painfully, cleaned my face and wiped up the floor of the bathroom. There’s really no other way to describe how I felt, other than that my stomach _hurt_. The discomfort mounted with even slight movements, and I ended up squatting down, clutching my midsection and concentrating my breathing. I started thinking that I might not be catching up to Beta, after all. The way I was headed, I’d be setting myself up to die a pretty stupid, easily preventable death. 

I made my way out of the bathroom, barely able to stay on my feet, and approached Babs.

“I’m going to hang here and oversee things today,” I said, attempting to don a disguise of health and high spirits. “Give Blue a chance to take a crack at being field leader.”

“You sure that’s a good idea?” asked Babs absently as she focused on the screen. “You’re a little better suited to field leader on this mission…”

“He’ll be fine,” I assured her, and drew up some holographs to individually monitor the mission. I got in touch with Jaime via communicator and let him know that he was officially squad leader for that mission. When the line was dropped, Babs looked up at me from her chair, and frowned. 

“You okay?” she asked. “You look a little pale…”

“I’m fine. Just didn’t sleep all that great, I guess.”

She looked back at the holograph. “Yeah… I didn’t, either.”

There was silence as we watched the screens.

“I’m really sorry about yesterday,” she said, folding her arms around herself.

I shook my head, all traces of anger gone in an instant. “Don’t be, it’s okay.”

“Just… kind of was having one of my Hulk Smash Days.”

After Babs was first landed in the Chair of Doom, as we came to semi-lovingly call it (I eventually helped her decorate it in all manner of things, stickers, fandom paraphernalia, and suchlike), she was on a bit of an ocean tide of emotions, from feeling positive and motivated about adjusting to her new life to throwing things and cussing a blue streak at everything and anything that came into view. As such, her mother and I took to calling her not-so-good intervals her “Reverend Lowe” or “Mr. Hyde” or “Hulk Smash Days.” Without waiting for a cue, I laid a hand on her shoulder, and squeezed it.

“Babs,” I said, “you’re entitled to having emotions without them being pigeon-holed into a Hulk Smash Day, okay? I wasn’t really anything short of Reverend Lowe, myself, so… I should be apologizing, too.” I smiled down at her. “I’m sorry.”

She gave me a half-hearted smile in return. “Forgiven. Friends?”

“You know it.”

“Good. Because I think I’d be missing some fundamental aspect of my life if you weren’t around to eternally push my buttons and make me question my sanity.”

My stomach burned and twisted. A wash of shakiness came over me and I worried I might get sick right about then. My nose dripped, and I hurried to swipe the blood away before Babs could see it.

“Well, I’ve got you covered there,” I said, keeping my voice light. “I’ll make it my mission in life to continually make you fit for a straitjacket, okay?”

She grinned. “Deal. Um…” Her smile faded. “You know, are you sure you’re feeling okay? You don’t look so good…”

I patted her shoulder. “Don’t worry about me. Let’s focus on the mission.”

She nodded. “All right…”

We set to, and I was thankful she didn’t ask me about how I was feeling again.

A few hours later, as mission debriefings were wrapping up, I got a call from Bruce. 

“Yeah?” I said, biting back a sigh. I knew what was coming, and braced for it.

“Pretty severe nosebleed earlier. You go to the med-lab?” he asked. 

“No. I sparred with Black Canary this morning and she socked me in the face,” I fibbed. “My nose has been bleeding off and on all day. I don’t need to go to the med-lab or anything.”

He grunted. “Did you protect yourself?”

“Obviously not.”

“Hmm. Still learning, even now.”

“It’s a learning experience,” I told him. “See you later.”

I hung up before he could say anything more, and left to Zeta Tube back to Bludhaven. In the warehouse, I unsuited, shrugging the armored pieces with a sigh of relief as their weight was removed from my aching muscles. Peeling the top half of the suit away from my torso, a bright splotch of color on my shoulder caught my eye. 

I craned my neck to investigate, and, at what I saw, I hurried to a mirror to better study my shoulders. Reaching the glass, my heart and stomach skittered and seemed to become entangled.

“What the fuck…?” I breathed, ogling my back, illuminated beneath the sickly, flourescent glow of the overhead lights. 

I was covered in a smattering of bruises and red marks, just like the ones on my legs, oddly cheerful-looking strawberry-like blotches all dispersed atop the white, drained, translucent flesh. Bursts of blue and black, like ink unfurling in water, created a contrast beneath the variegations of red and white. I mentally went over all of my recent field activity, and realized that I hadn’t been out on any active missions in over a week—and also that I hadn’t been sparring much, either. There wasn’t a single explanation for the Pollock painting that spread all over my back. 

I quelled the rising panic, keeping it compartmentalized in my already smarting gut, and threw on the jeans and T-shirt that I had tossed in my bag in the warehouse. I left the building through the back, and headed in the direction of my apartment. I planned on calling the doctor from there, although again, I considered the ER. The late morning sunlight was penetratingly hot and bright, but I felt chilled, somehow, as though I couldn’t quite get warm. I rubbed at my temples and threw on the pair of sunglasses I had in my pocket. My personal cell phone buzzed against my hip.

I muttered a four-letter word, and checked the screen—Bruce, again. Against my better judgment, I answered.

“Why’d you lie to me?” he said, right off the bat.

“What are you talking about?” I sighed tiredly. 

“You did _not_ spar with Dinah this morning.”

“I had a nosebleed,” I said. “Big whoop. Let’s call Godfrey and have him broadcast it.”

“Don’t. Joke,” Bruce snapped. “Why would you lie?”

I paused, finding a public bench that overlooked the water, and sat down. My ankles, shins, knees, hips—everything—ached, and I came to the realization that I wanted nothing more than to have my own parents there, right about then. It doesn’t matter who takes you in after you lose your mom and dad. And it doesn’t matter how old you are, either, when things like this happen. In the end, depending on what your relationship with them is like, you inevitably want your parents. 

But, for as glacial and unapproachable as Bruce might have been (and really still is), he _was_ the father that stepped up to fill the role after my own dad died. And, sitting on that bench, unable to bring myself to speak into the phone, I knew that there was no longer any denying that something was seriously, seriously wrong with me. And, with these recognitions, I found that I wanted Bruce nearby after all. 

I watched the water, and finally said into the expectant silence, “I’ll call you later.”

I hit the “End” prompt, and pocketed my phone. I rose, retraced my steps to the warehouse, and Zeta Tubed to Gotham. 

I raided one of our outposts there in the city, nabbed a bike, strapped on a helmet, and headed to the manor. The wind on my skin was warm and soothing, and the old, consistent landmarks (the big “Trade-N-Post” gas station with the giant, ceramic flower sculpture at the door, the mailbox carved into the shape of a dragon that had been there since I first came to Gotham, the colorful entrance to the Botanical Gardens) that punctuated the route home were comforting. When I reached the driveway, I propped up the cycle, and paused for a moment, collecting my thoughts. I entered the manor unannounced, hearing the customary trio of beeps that accompanied the opening of the door via the security system. 

Alfred, hearing the sound, arrived in the foyer, and greeted me there. 

“Master Richard,” he said happily. “So good to see that college life won’t be keeping you from us forever.”

I smiled, my spirits lifting. “Wouldn’t dream of letting it, Alfred. Is Bruce here?”

“Yes. He is… down below. Shall I retrieve him for you?”

“If you wouldn’t mind.”

“Of course not.” He paused, and studied me with a knowing eye. “If I do say so, Master Dick, you’re looking a little… peaked. Too many wild university parties?”

I chuckled. “Something like that.” 

“Well, then. Is there anything I can do for you before I fetch Master Bruce? Water, saltine crackers, aspirin, hair of the dog…?”

I shook my head, then leaned it on my hand, and smiled at him. “Not _that_ hungover, no worries.”

He nodded, and vanished. 

When Bruce entered the parlor, I described to him what I’d experienced over the past few weeks, and showed him the weird markings across my back and shoulders. His response wasn’t quite what I expected.

Okay—so I assumed he’d choke and send me off with Alfred to see a doctor, while he hid away in the Bat Cave plugged into all of his computer screens, which, granted, would have been fine—I loved (love) Alfred and was perfectly comfortable with him by my side in times like these, and I completely got that Bruce had trouble with situations like these (i.e. ones that require some nurturing on his part) and didn’t hold it against him. But, the hard truth is that if I was ever in any real danger in the years that we had spent side-by-side as Batman and Robin, Bruce would go, in a microsecond, from this icy, insurmountable Everest to a warm, shady tree—something sturdy and protective. 

And my assumptions were a total disservice. Within a few minutes he had loaded me into the passenger seat of his black Lotus, and had sped me through traffic to land with squealing tires in the parking lot of the medical office some client friend of his owned (after scaring and infuriating the absolute crap out of just about every driver unfortunate enough to be on the road that day.) Bruce left me in the waiting room while he talked to his client, this doctor who owned the practice, and then returned, informing me that I’d be fit into the afternoon scheduled appointments. 

So, I filled out paperwork, and sat in the waiting room with Bruce. I leaned into the back of the chair, and just _really_ didn’t feel well. My very bones seemed to hurt and I couldn’t pull myself out of a semi-half-asleep state. My stomach was twisting into knots and painfully untying those knots, then retying them, and tying more knots upon those knots, and on and on in an agonizing cycle. 

I was a little surprised when Bruce asked about Babs, and more surprised when I heard myself willingly opening up to him about the situation. I was still even further surprised when Bruce really seemed to make a legitimate effort to offer some wisdom and support. I barely registered what he said—he could have recited a recipe for mashed potatoes for all I cared. His words, whatever they might have been, and his _interest,_ were deeply comforting to me, all the same. 

When I was called into the back, I sat on the examination table, timing my breaths to the tightening in my abdomen, which was starting to work its way into my chest. After a while, the nurse came in and performed an array of usual nursey things, like checking my vitals and taking my height and weight and such. She left me then, to wait some more. I closed my eyes, almost drifting off a couple of times. 

Finally, the door opened, and I snapped to as Bruce’s client, Dr. Pieter Cross, according to his nametag, entered. His crisp, blue shirt and navy-printed white tie matched the room. His demeanor was amicable and warm, and I relaxed right away as he smiled at me.

“Ah, yes, you must be Bruce’s boy,” he said in a vaguely accented voice. “Richard, yes?”

I didn’t correct him in his error. Bruce and I favor each other enough that I’m commonly mistaken to be his son by blood. Dr. Cross reached out to shake my hand. 

“Dick, yeah,” I said. “Nice to meet you.”

“Yes, you, as well. So… I understand we had quite a substantial nosebleed this morning, also some unexplained bruising…? That’s what brings you in today?”

“Uh, yeah…” I scratched at my nose, as though I expected it to start bleeding again. “I’ve had a couple of nosebleeds the last few weeks, and I turned up with some red marks and bruises on my back and legs this morning.”

“Mm-hmm… Any other issues like bleeding gums, or blood in your urine?”

I nodded. “Yeah.” 

I unhappily realized that I may have inaccurately attributed the hematuria to a couple of poundings I took from Vandal Savage and his goons as my squad tracked their doings alongside those of Darkseid’s. It was disheartening to learn that this thing I somewhat commonly dealt with might have been connected to all of the other weird things I’d been experiencing.

Dr. Cross shuffled through the papers on his clipboard. “Temp is about 101… No transfusions or shots in recent months... No family history of immunity problems..." He raised his eyes to me. "Have you experienced anything else, like… bone pain, chills, loss of appetite?”

I nodded. “All of the above, yeah.”

He reached out, his hands hovering over my neck. “May I?”

I nodded, and he pressed at my lymph nodes. I could feel how painfully engorged they were at his touch.

“Real swollen… And how have you been feeling otherwise?”

“Um… Well, my stomach has been hurting. Like… _really_ hurting.”

“Any constipation?”

I groaned. “Oh, yeah.” 

He nodded, frowning. “Okay, and may I see your bruises?”

I nodded. “Sure.”

I lifted my shirt up over my back, and Dr. Cross took a look at my new, unwanted tattoo.

“And you have not had any accidents, falls, or been involved in any recent altercations, anything of that nature?”

I shook my head, for once telling the truth. “No. None that I can recall, anyway.” 

"Mm. And... How long has this been going on?"

"Um... A couple of weeks? Months? I mean... I think. I've been feeling lousy for a while, but the bruising and bleeding and stuff started fairly recently."

"Okay, and no drug use?"

I shook my head. "No, never."

“All right,” he said thoughtfully. “Let’s get the basic physical performed, and then, once we’ve completed that, I’d like to send you down the hall to have some bloodwork done. We’ll push these tests through as priority, and should have the results of the CBC and blood smear by tomorrow around 4:30.”

I didn’t like the sound of that. “Okay.”

“After you have your blood drawn to be tested, I’ll send you next door to have a bone marrow extraction.”

I stared at him, suddenly packed with dread. “Bone marrow—why?”

“There are just some things I’d like to rule out,” said Dr. Cross, peering into my ears. “I’ll give my associate a call and let him know you’ll be along this afternoon to have the sample taken. Better to be safe than sorry and get it done as soon as possible.”

He listened to my heart, then my lungs, and then had me lie down to probe my painful abdomen with his fingers. It hurt like _hell._ I clenched my teeth and held my breath as he endlessly poked at my stomach, then, when he clasped a particularly sore spot on my left side beneath my ribs, I gasped and flinched, unable to help myself.

“Found a bit of an ouch, I take it. Your spleen is pretty enlarged,” he said. His questing fingers moved to my right side, and I flat-out made an undignified, wordless, squawking proclamation of my discomfort when he applied _way_ more pressure than I thought was even remotely necessary to the most focalized source of the pain in my belly.

“Found a bigger ouch,” he said, by now frowning in a way that gave me a lot of pause.

I just nodded mutely, and endured the remainder of the exam. He wrote me prescriptions for prednisone and high-dose acetimenophen to help with the pain in my stomach, bones and joints, told me to avoid things like ginger products, green tea, tomato-based foods and other anticoagulants, and suggested I drink plenty of fluids with electrolytes to combat the issues incumbent upon easy bleeding and bruising. Then, I was sent to get the blood work done, which was, thankfully, swift and fairly painless, in spite of the nurse needing to apply two bandages to the puncture site, since I bled like some victim of a mutant fruit attack in a Troma film after the needle was removed. 

Bruce ended up accompanying me to the office next door to have the bone marrow extraction performed. The process wasn’t that terrible to me, but I could see how some people would break out into a cold sweat just thinking about the procedure. It hurt a bit, but not nearly as badly as Cross squishing my enlarged spleen or pressing his fingers into my abdomen had. 

I took the pain pills and corticosteroid on the drive back to the manor. Not particularly wanting to be alone, I decided to stay there that night. At dinner (which I ineffectually pushed around on my plate), Bruce told me that he had let Kaldur and Babs know that I would be on leave for a while.

“Did you tell them why?” I queried, rolling a pea under my fork and watching with childish delight as it traveled across my plate.

“I didn’t.”

“Okay, did they press you for any answers or anything?”

“Barbara did,” said Bruce.

I looked at him. “What’d you tell her?”

“I gave her plenty of effective misdirection, don’t worry,” he assured me. “Try to eat more.”

I dropped my head to the table with an exasperated groan. “Ugh, _Bruce.”_

“I’m serious.”

“What am I, twelve?”

“No,” said Bruce, “but you _are_ sick, and you won’t be doing yourself any favors by neglecting your needs.”

I glowered at him, my chin still resting on the tabletop. “Forcing food down my throat is neglecting my needs.”

“You _are_ twelve,” he said. “Eat.”

I fake-cried into the table. “Nooooooo.”

He pointedly nudged the plate at me, and I cast him a withering glare. However, I did my damnedest to choke something past my swollen lymph nodes.

“So you’ve been decidedly not vociferous about what you think might be going on here,” I said. “That’s not like you.”

Bruce didn’t look in my direction. “It doesn’t matter what I think. We’ll know for sure tomorrow.”

I had a very good idea of what was probably wrong with me by then, and I was sure he did, too, but I didn’t want to say it any more than Bruce did. 

My team-only cell phone buzzed in my pocket, and I removed it to check the screen.

“You know, if you read text messages at business meetings—”

“It’s Rose,” I said. “Besides, I’m in school for CEH and network security, not to get my MBA.” 

“I don’t care who it is. You need to take care of yourself. Sit and eat.”

I ignored him and read the text.

_OMG—Tim is SUCH a dick._

_Pardon my use of the term._

I rolled my eyes, and waved the phone at Bruce. 

“Sorry. Teen crises beckon.” I got up to leave.

“You watch yourself,” said Bruce.

I turned. “What?”

“She’s pretty taken with you,” he said.

“Stop traffic. What are you trying to say?”

“I’m not saying anything, Dick. But she’s impressionable _._ Easily misled. Be careful.”

I sighed. “My middle name, Bruce.”

I knew very well that Rose, my protégé, had a crush on me, and a _big_ one—a deaf, dumb, blind alien unfamiliar with human courtship rituals would have been able to see it. Already painfully obvious to absolutely everyone _,_ it was confirmed when Zatanna came up to me one afternoon and told me through her scandalized giggles that Rose had just gushed to all of her female teammates that I was going to be Her First, whether I knew it yet or not. Awkward turtle. I really had no idea how the heck I should go about breaking her heart, something that was completely unavoidable, and inevitable, and probably better to get out of the way sooner rather than later—but damned if it wasn’t an intimidating enterprise. No matter how gently I gave her the shaft (and not the shaft she apparently wanted), her dad—freaking _Deathstroke,_ FYI _—_ would with all likelihood stick my gonads on a pike in his front yard as a warning to all the other hapless saps that had the balls to hurt her feelings. 

I headed up to my old bedroom in the manor, which Alfred always left as it was, and lay down on my old bed. I took in the sense of coming home for a moment, a sensation I hadn’t anticipated, then I texted Rose.

_What did that ninnyhammer do?_

Home. I looked around. Same posters, same bedding, same rug, same plants, same curtains. It sounds silly, but the familiarity of the room gave me a sense of calm.

My phone dinged. I slid my thumb across the screen.

_Jackass got me written up with Oracle and Aqualad about some field work earlier. Dad finds out and I’m doomed to die an early death. >.< Better find someone to play Taps at my funeral… I prefer cherry to pine._

I closed my eyes and tried to think Zen thoughts. I texted Babs’ team cell.

_So what happened with Ravager?_

She replied within a moment.

_Ugghhhh it was SUCH a mess. They got sent out this afternoon to nab Kid Cold, and when Tim went to milk answers out of him, Rose shattered KC’s tibia/fibula and put him in shock. Three guesses how many answers we ended up getting then… -_-;_

I set the phone down, grabbed a pillow, jammed it over my face, and screamed into it. Then, tossing the pillow aside, I picked up my cell phone to message Rose. 

_Yes… Let the hate flow through you… Yeeeahhhh, on second thought, scratch that. Allow the hate to flow through you, and inevitable, failure is. But channel your anger, and succeed, you shall. (I just got the 411.) Got to let that anger go, Padawan… Stay whelmed, on and off the field. I agree with the write-up. (Sorry.) :-( Repeat after me: I will not strong-arm bad guys and put them in shock with my incredible badassery. Badassery will be kept to a minimum. Observation: Badassery too badass for average bad guy only fluent in assery to handle. :-)_

A few minutes later, the phone buzzed again, and I smiled when I read the message.

_I can’t repeat after you yet, RT—you forgot to mention “I will not blind the bad guys with my stunning good looks.” Except I can’t promise I won’t… ;-)_

I punched in my own reply:

_Dude. Step off. That’s MY job._

_Buzz._

_CALL YOU FABIO._

I laughed out loud. After our mission to Apokalips, I had managed to exit the Boom Tube with Clark barely half a second before it was disbanded, and after ensuring that everyone was accounted for, I had gone over to Rose to congratulate her on a job well done. She was so relieved that I had made it out of the Tube before I could be banished along with it into nothingness (it was really a close call for both Superman and me) that she glomped me right there, leaping on me and squeezing me so tightly that blood leaked out of my wounds and popped my already busted ribs. Ignoring the discomfort, I hugged her back for a few minutes and told her how amazing she was on that rescue mission (which was the honest truth—she was absolutely on fire and operated with as much calm and expertise as the most seasoned League veteran; I was overwhelmingly proud of her), then, when she finally hopped down, she brought to light the fact that I still wore the radiation mask. I peeled it off, then shook out my sweaty hair, sprinkling her with perspiration, and said in a horrible accent, “Call me Fabio!” 

I returned her text.

 _In seriousness—no more leg-breaking_. 

_Buzz._

_I’ll break YOUR leg. But okay, fine. Whatever you say, Master Yoda._

I smiled, set the phone down on my nightstand, and yanked my jeans and shirt off to go to bed. It was only 8:30, and not even dark out, but I was fried. Long day and all that. Although a part of me stressed over the phone call that would come the following afternoon, I was really too bushed to lose sleep over it, and I ended up out like a light until about 7:15 in the morning. I woke up, again, due to stomach and bone pain, and immediately took the pain-killers. They didn’t completely kill the discomfort, seeing as how they were really just glorified Tylenol, but they shaved a bit off its sharp surface, enabling me to exist somewhat out of the dead-ish state I had been in the day before. 

I headed into the gym, where I spent some time on the bar, then the rings. It was a demoralizing workout. I could feel the weakness in my body even as I performed the first muscle up, and I could barely manage a backuprise to handstand—about as basic as it gets—without my entire body trembling. I gave up, plugged away with legs stumping about like concrete slabs on the treadmill, got frustrated, and finally quit. I indulged in some Thai-Chi— _much_ better for the condition I was in, and then was coaxed out of the gym when Alfred informed me he’d taken note of the fact that I was up and had food ready. I felt like crap, but struggled with it out of respect for his efforts. 

“Master Richard,” he said, noticing that I was just as put off by food as yesterday, “if it is such an insufferable chore, then please, do not feel obligated to suffer it for my sake.”

“Thank you,” I breathed, dropping my fork. 

I helped Alfred clean up, and, with some happiness, I realized that I had a whole day of freedom ahead—a remarkable concept. I had been trying in recent weeks to finish the book I was reading, but I hadn’t found the time, thanks to school and the job. I had plenty of opportunity to get started on my summer reading list for the upcoming literature course I was signed up for, so, with some triumph, I grabbed the paperback copy of _House of Leaves_ and headed into the garden. 

It was hot and muggy that day, unusually so for May in Gotham, and I sprawled out under a lilac tree to read. The grass, always well-kept by the gardener Bruce hired to maintain the grounds, was soft under my back, and I spent most of that day resting in the shade, reading. Once I finished the book, I laid it down beside me, and found myself dwelling on Babs.

So much had happened in recent months between her and me. It was almost too much to process. Still, I couldn’t seem to force it from my brain—it was a series of video files, all on playback.

I pilfered—yes, pilfered—a kiss from her not long before my nineteenth birthday, about a year and a half before. After a mission, Babs and I left the Watchtower together. It had been an interesting night, that we continued to animatedly discuss as we headed to this place in Bludhaven called Dino’s Café that is, as far as I know, still the only 24-hour coffeeshop in the city. We had switched to different topics by the time we got there, and continued to talk after we got our drinks and sat down. Before we realized it, the clock had ticked to six in the morning—meaning we’d been there for five hours. We decided it was probably time to move on, and so, we crept off to the Gotham Zeta Tube, and I walked her the rest of the way home. 

It was November, cold, and still dark out. She pulled her crocheted scarf up around her neck, and inclined her head toward the door. 

“My mom is _so_ going to have vapors over this,” she murmured, giggling. “Then again, why I even _have_ a curfew is beyond me. Last I checked, the Joker doesn’t careif I have to be home by midnight…”

I pulled a package of Altoids out of my back pocket and shrugged. “You can blame it on me. Just tell her it was a really long-winded speech at some Mathletes alumni thing.”

There was a moment of silence, one of those incredibly awkward moments during which both parties just kind of sustain eye contact while seriously entertaining the idea of kissing each other, but are too uncertain of the other’s feelings to make the first move. Babs had kissed me ages ago on my fourteenth birthday—but I wasn’t really sure if a peck on the lips in the closet during a game of Spin the Bottle had any sort of staying power, or even really counted. Things change over the years.

Well, only one way to test the waters, I figured. I snapped open the Altoids tin and produced one of the little, round mints. 

“Want one?” I asked.

Her eyes flitted down and she shrugged, shifted her weight a bit, and half-smiled. “Sure, why not.”

Before she could reach for one, I snapped the lid closed, popped the mint into my mouth and said, “Come and get it.”

She stared at me, then huffed an astonished laugh.

I laughed, too, taking her apparent discomfiture as a rejection.

“Sorry, here…” I said, by then feeling like a total moron.

As I was about to reopen the tin, she locked her fingers in the collar of my coat, yanked me toward her, and pressed her lips to mine. My whole body went live in that instant. Before I knew it, I felt her tongue, and then the mint was gone. She backed away with a smug smile, let go of my jacket, and triumphantly crunched the mint in her teeth. 

“Don’t mind if I do,” she said happily. “So, um… see you tomorrow?”

“…Today,” I said. My heart was still spazzing out. 

She laughed. “Right. Well… Good night.”

“Morning.”

She flushed and giggled. “Stop it.”

I shook my head. “I can’t be stopped, sorry.”

She grinned as I pulled her toward me, then, suddenly, we were kissing again. This time, there were no mints to be passed around—but plenty of spit was swapped. This was no longer a game shared by experimenting kids. I drew back, and bumped her nose with mine. She backed away with a smile, grasped my fingers a little overlong, and finally went inside. I pretty much floated home.

Later, I learned through the grapevine that she didn’t consider us to be a couple, so, when Bette gave me an opening at midnight on my birthday some weeks following this first kiss and Babs was kept busy with a college function, I took it. I can’t lie, I was a little bummed by Babs’ apparent nonchalance regarding the kisses we exchanged, and it frankly felt pretty damn good to think of _anything_ other than my parents and my stung feelings on my stupid birthday (one of my least favorite days of the year, thank you.) Whether or not my behavior that night might have resulted in a bit of a broken heart-related mess occurred to me only in passing, and a little too late—we were already inflagrante. I pushed the thought from my mind, and kept doing what I was doing. The thought that Babs would come to me and express legitimate interest as soon as the night following didn’t even enter my brain. At the Watchtower the next evening (officially my birthday), I accepted kisses from Zatanna and Raquel, joked about it with Tim, and then, when the usual insane Team business was wrapped up, I headed home. I was taken aback when I saw Babs sitting at the base of the stairs leading up to my apartment.

She didn’t waste any time. Within a second of encountering her there, she’d come up and kissed me. I figured “screw it,” popped the L-word on her, and asked in plain language why we weren’t together. She said what I figured she would—that, in Wally’s words, I was a dog, and not ready for her yet. Given that yeah, I was widely regarded as a whore, I couldn’t really blame her for thinking that—but the truth was that I’d have dropped absolutely anything and everything for her. 

I know it sounds trite and cheesy. Not justifying previous behavior or anything, but any jumping from girl-to-girl and my one-night-stand with Bette aside, I was _never_ a cheater, and it’s not like I was a _totally_ hopeless commitment-phobe—I loved (love) Barb and was fully willing by that time to go long-term and serious.

On the subject of getting serious, things got interesting in my bedroom. We spent some time on my bed after she presented my gift (a bit of a throwback gag in the form of a _Gargoyles_ poster), just kind of listening to music and talking. Then, we were kissing. It escalated quickly from there—within a few minutes, I’d kind of let my hands start wandering, and so had she. When her palm passed over the quickly growing ridge in my jeans, she giggled a little against my mouth. 

“Uhhh… don’t mind that,” I said, drawing in a breath when I felt her teeth press a little against my lower lip, then I lost my breath entirely when she, with an impish look, gave me a squeeze. Within a moment she’d unbuckled my belt, gotten the waist of my jeans open, and then was pulling at my shirt. I helped her yank it away, and kind of got transported to another dimension when she moved her lips over my throat, down my chest, my abdomen, and—other places. I committed a cardinal sex sin and involuntarily clutched at her hair. I was about four seconds from hearing the Hallelujah chorus when she agonizingly _stopped—_ but moved back up my body to flat-out kiss me on the mouth. I unzipped the back of her dress, and leaned back into the pile of pillows at the headboard of the bed as she pulled the emerald material over her head. I, again, committed a sex crime; this time staring like a total creeper. My favorite underwear is usually on the floor, but she had on the most ridiculouslycute bra (this light blue thing with a little print of clouds and rainbows all over it) and bright red boyshort panties that were so _her_ I about died. She snaked her arms behind her back, unhooked the bra, and let it drop. I’d have been happy to kick back and admire the (perfect) view a little longer (I was totally gunning for sex jail), but she leaned down to kiss me, and I shifted her over to her back, and shook my jeans and boxers the rest of the way off. She followed suit and shed the (adorable) boyshorts. I dropped a kiss on her jaw, her collarbone. My hands sought to chart some as-yet unexplored territory. 

“Dick,” she said, laying a hand on my chest. “Um…”

I paused, hovering over her. I was very, very conscious of her body under mine, and the pressure of her thighs against my hips. “What’s wrong?”

“I, uh…” She gave me a bit of a sheepish smile. “I’ve never.” She shook her head.

I could have _sworn_ she had done it with Roger from Mathletes. Or at least with that Bobby guy from that Black Hat Convention. 

“Oh. Wow. Uh…” I fought to articulate. “Pressure’s on…?” 

Then, I just hovered there, feeling decidedly stupid, and suddenly a hell of a lot less willing to go through with it. At about that second, the song changed, and Babs turned her head.

“So… random? But… I like this song,” she said, and bit playfully at my chin. 

“Barb,” I said, peering down at her. 

She arched her brows. “Dick.”

“Look, we don’t—”

“Oh, don’t even start with that crap,” she laughed. “Like _you’re_ the sensitive type…”

I grinned, and kissed her. “I don’t know… if I love you… and I do… I _think_ I’m pretty sensitive.”

She smiled, her eyes a beautiful shade of cerulean blue in the lamplight. “…I love you more, hero.”

I paused on that for a second, and then, a mutual decision wordlessly reached, grabbed a condom and futzed with it. Leaning over her again, I was careful, and took things slowly. She hissed a little when and squeezed her fingers into my shoulders when, with the customary sense that something had given way, I was _there._

I’ll be up front—I’ve _never_ heard a girl recount her First Time with any sort of twee, nostalgic longing, and frankly, like I had said—the pressure was on. I didn’t want Barb’s First to hurt so badly she cried the whole time and ended up walking around all tilty and like she had a peg-leg for a week, I didn’t want her to look back on it and feel secondhand embarrassment about my discomposing mouth-breathing and maladroit thrusts like fish-flops, and I didn’t want it to end before she even realized I was _in_ there (yeah… that happened my own first time with Raquel. The _second_ time was conducted with more success.) With this in mind, I fought all urges and moved a little guardedly at first, staying attuned to her cues, until she arched her back under me and impatiently dragged her fingers down my spine, then pressed her hands hard on the small of my back. Okay. Cue taken. With the music going, I visited about fifty different space-time continuums and totally lost myself until I finally came so hard that I was astounded I didn’t rocket us both into separate zip codes. I moaned. I saw stars. My ears rang. I fell on her. There was absolutely _no_ such thing as dignity.

I lay breathing, felt bad that I was sweating on her for a second, and looked up when she stroked my hair. 

“…Happy Birthday,” she said, her grin spreading to an impossible breadth. 

“Yeah,” I said breathlessly, and laughed. “Happy Birthday to me.” 

Come morning, after she further misled her parents as to where she had been the night prior, we headed over to Dino’s, then walked around Bludhaven for a while. We played a game that we invented back in high school that was constructed entirely off of people-watching, during which we’d build an entire history and storyline around a person based on what they were doing and what their apparent moods were (usually tongue-in-cheek and derisive.) We headed into a few shops, and I bought Babs a copy of _Gone With the Wind_ and a handmade pair of mittens with little red and white toadstools knit into them from a local designer. 

It was a good day.

But… With the good things, come the bad. The night she was shot, one of the worst nights I can remember having, can’t be overlooked or ignored. 

I’d been on my hiatus from the Team for a while by then. Barbara and I had put a title on things, but even that didn’t seem to be enough to bring me back. A few months of rest, school with its structure, and regular performances with Haly’s had helped usher in some healing after Wally died, but I just couldn’t bring myself to return to duty—at least, not yet. I’d find myself wishing to God that I had re-thought that hesitation by the time that night was through.

I was asleep when my personal cell rang. I was tired, so I silenced it, and turned over. It went off again, and again. Then, a fourth time. Finally, frustrated, I grabbed it, and saw that Barbara’s mom was calling. I looked at the time—past four in the morning. Wide awake in that half-second and a little disconcerted, I answered. 

“Dick?” 

Thelma’s voice. And it shook—badly. Icy feelers rearranged the ventricles in my heart. 

“Mrs. Gordon?” I said. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s Barbara,” she said, and then, just like that, she started sobbing. My heart _stopped—_ I mean point blank stopped. No beats. No breath. Nothing.

“What happened.” My voice was forced through an opening in my throat that was rapidly shrinking.

“She was—shot—earlier this evening. The Joker. Dick—they don’t know if she’ll make it. If she does—it still doesn’t look good. They said she’ll probably never walk again.”

I had leapt out of bed, yanked on the first available pair of pants, and was out the door before she was done speaking. It was early October, and unusually, extremely cold. I didn’t bother with a jacket and didn’t lock the door, either. I just blindly sped down the steps and jumped atop the motorcycle I kept. 

“Where is she?”

“She’s at Gotham General, still in surgery—”

“I’m on my way, just hang on.”

I thrust my phone into my pocket, threw my helmet on, and sped to the Zeta Tubes. I made it to the hospital in less than five minutes. 

The next hours were the most unthinkable torment. She died, was revived, died again, was brought back. It was preposterous that my heart kept working after being ripped in two so many times. It was confirmed the entirety of her lower spinal cord had been completely severed and that the bullet had tumbled and lodged in her liver. And still worse, when she at last stabilized, they wouldn’t even let me in to see her because I wasn’t family. 

Regardless, I stayed in that waiting room, freezing in my tee-shirt, not eating, pounding coffee until my hands shook and my head throbbed, sensing the time as it crawled and flew by all at once, and half-conversing with filtering friends for over thirty-six hours, before Commissioner Gordon convinced the staff to let me go see her. Since the ICU is a serious infection risk, he had to make a really big to-do about it. Eventually, the staff gave in, and after I shamelessly gave Jim a bone-snapping hug to say thanks, I _finally_ was led to Barbara’s bedside. 

The sight of her in the hospital bed seemed to suck all solidarity out of my legs. I’ve fought with psychotic criminals, powerful despots, mutated monsters. I’d witnessed friends, and my parents, die. But somehow, this one image of Babs sent me straight to my seat in the chair at her side. She was a study in perpetual motion—always busy, always thinking, always moving. And now—she lay pale, inert, silent; sinking into the bed as though it were a patch of white quicksand that threatened to swallow her up. I took her hand, and just sat beside her with her unmoving fingers grasped in mine, and waited. So much time in the hospital is spent waiting that they ought to just be referred to as giant waiting rooms. Almost an entire day, and I was still waiting, and hoping, and praying. I looked down at the motionless shape of her legs beneath the blanket. That they were all too likely to remain immobile closed off my throat and pressed down on my chest. Babs _adored_ running. Her spirit positively leapt at every road, every trail, every track. Exhausted and overwhelmed, I lifted her limp hand to my cheek, and let the tears come. 

I stayed like that until Mrs. Gordon laid a hand on my shoulder and woke me up. I hadn’t even realized I’d fallen asleep. When I turned to look at her, she said I should go home and rest. I refused, at first, but she promised she’d call the second there was any change. 

I made it home, forced myself to shower, and then lay across my unmade bed, the phone at my side. I didn’t sleep.

Barbara came to a few days later, and after the horrible series of pinpricks, attempted stimuli, and tests to check her range of sensation and mobility, it was confirmed that she had lost all use of her lower body. Whether she would regain any movement or feeling below her waist remained to be seen, but the doctor said it was unlikely, given the severity of the spinal injury itself. Babs sobbed for probably a few solid hours, intermittently in my arms, and then in her parents’, until she tapered off and lay back in silence, not sleeping, but not speaking, either. 

And then began the up-and-down days of recuperating, adjusting, re-learning basic things like controlling her bathroom functions to tying her shoes without pitching facefirst to the floor, how to maneuver her wheelchair, and so on. Thanks to Alfred, Dinah, and Bruce, I had a very good knowledge of physical therapy and training and such, so, I exercised her legs for her every morning, and had her go through some upper body routines to compensate for her lower. The exercises, the doctor said, were good for her, and I noticed that they boosted her spirits considerably, so no matter what was going on at a given time (be it class or whatever), I showed up and went through them with her daily, even after she was determined to be recovering well enough to be sent home. 

Bruce (well, Batman, rather), as always, worked over Thanksgiving, and Christmas, so I spent both holidays with Barbara and her family. I uncomfortably shrank into my seat when Commissioner Gordon stood up at Thanksgiving dinner and tearfully toasted me for how tirelessly I had stuck by and taken care of his daughter in her dire time of need. I didn’t really feel like anything I had done was particularly special—I mean, it wasn’t like I’d done a whole lot beyond what Jim himself had done. But Mrs. Gordon had reached over, and squeezed my hand when Jim was done, and Babs had leaned over in her chair and hugged me. I felt like sinking into the floor, undeserving of such lavish praise. 

Still, I guess the high favor worked out. Even though I knew it was a little impulsive, I headed to a jeweler in Gotham and deliberated over some engagement rings. After losing Wally, and then nearly losing my girlfriend, I didn’t want to waste a second with Babs, and so, once I settled on a ring, I called her father. 

We met at a coffee stand in Gotham by the water, and it was there that I asked Jim if he’d be opposed to the idea of my intended proposal. I was astonished when, without speaking, he gave me an awkward, violent, one-armed hug. 

“It would be an _honor,_ Dick,” he said forcefully.

“Can I get you to maybe let that attitude rub off on her a bit between now and the actual proposal?” I asked, chuckling and shaking the kinks out of my shoulders when he backed away. 

“Oh, of course, you bet,” he said, his smile beaming under his mustache. “So when do you plan on asking her?”

“Uh, actually… I hadn’t thought that far ahead…” I admitted, suddenly fretting a little. “Christmas Eve, maybe? Man, that seems like such a cliché.”

“Well, that’s all right. Just do it in a less clichéd way,” he said, still smiling. “Let’s call her mom and see if she has any suggestions.”

That part was fun, conspiring with friends and family on the best way to go about popping the question. I got to spend more time with my friends from the Team than I had in a while, and their enthusiasm regarding the subject was infectious. Inevitably, though, I was asked if I planned on returning to duty any time soon. I finally was feeling pulled a little, but I was truthful when I answered, and said I wasn’t quite sure I was ready. I’d failed Babs already and didn’t particularly feel like failing other teammates in worse ways.

The proposal itself went off without a hitch, including the hoped-for “yes,” and we set a date for the fall of the following year. She still had her “Hulk Smash/Reverend Lowe/Mr. Hyde” days, but she was recovering quickly, both physically and mentally. By mid-January, she was back at school, and within a week of that, she was back at work in the Watchtower, this time specializing in her adroit hacking skills and calling herself “Oracle.” Kaldur even went so far as to share leadership with her, and she proved herself more than capable in that position (as I knew she would.) 

As an aside, the incident that landed me back on the Team happened not long after she rejoined—Darkseid had the entirety of the League, and of Young Justice, incarcerated on Apokalips, where he intended to have his god-scientists twist them into these sort of mentally pliant super-soldiers that he could keep on hand to use at his disposal. The idea of an over-powered psychotic alien with an evil troop of Justice Leaguers didn’t bear thinking about, so, I said screw the fact that I was on hiatus, packed up Rose (who had been my protégé for a few months by then), Wolf and Sphere, and we Boom Tubed to Apokalips to attempt rescue. The thing was—the now-empty Team and League locations had already been burglarized, meaning we didn’t have enough radiation-resistant suits to go around. And Apokalips is one big, scorching desert of ionizing radiation that will either melt a person from the inside out or make them into an example of how the body’s cells are _not_ meant to mutate. I gave the last, partially damaged, but still functional radiation suit to Rose. The spare radiation mask was all I had for protection.

There’s a part of me that is always nervous in battle, but I really only remember being so starkly terrified to forget most details once the fight is over once—my first night as Robin, that is to say, my first encounter with Zucco’s goons. I was so freaking scared I can’t even tell you how the thing transpired. The only clear parts of that event are waiting concealed in the corner, my heart pounding so hard I felt it in my teeth, then standing afterward, my sticks bloody, and Batman at my side. My fight with Darkseid is a bit similar in my brain—fragmented and overlaid with a feeling of _fight_ reflex in full effect. I figured the second his hulking mass appeared in front of me as I wrangled with his parademons and hounds, it was over. Bye-bye, Nightwing! It’s bedtime! Still, I figured it to be far better to make him think maybe we human scum were made of tougher grit than he imagined than let my bladder go and beg for mercy as he chuffed with laughter and disintegrated me mid-whine, so I threw myself at him with absolutely everything I had. I remember flashes of it—twisting from his grip only to be laid out on my ass, Darkseid picking me up and carrying me (as I fought) over his head to hurl me into a pile of hounds, catching one Escrima stick in his teeth and cracking it to bits, waving the mist from my smoke grenade away with an uncaring pass of the hand. I knew he was toying with me even through the haze of fast-pumping adrenaline, but I had to keep fighting and hope that I was enough of an amusement that he wouldn’t decide to just incinerate me with his Omega Beam before help arrived. After he flipped me over onto my back and sent an elbow into my sternum (um—ow) I coughed blood, tried to forget how clamped my chest felt, and leapt up. I slid between his legs (I’m tall by earth standards, but rodentine compared to Darkseid), and from behind, using his enormous shoulders as a brace, I vaulted into a handstand atop his shoulders to come down into a crouch over his head. Before he could wrest me off, I jammed Plastique putty into both of his eyes, pressed with my heels against his trap muscles to spring into a salto, landed on my feet some ways off, and detonated the explosive putty. I figured it was a mistake immediately after, since he slowly turned on me, his eyes now glowing red. He was done with this fight. My life passed before my eyes—no joke. 

Before he could dissolve my molecules into space dust, Superman appeared out of the clear (red) sky like a ballistic missile and creamed Darkseid with some efficiency, grabbed me by the arm, and, with a leap that gave me whiplash and about ripped my shoulder out of its socket, zoomed off to pull me inside the Boom Tube. It was in the process of closing—I wasn’t sure if it affected Clark, but I could feel the pressure mounting inside my ears even as my chest seemed to stretch wider and wider. We fell out of the mouth of the Tube within a half-second of it closing entirely. 

I figured I’d forcibly just ended my hiatus from the Team by that time, as I sat drawing in whistling breaths through the pain from my broken ribs and fractured sternum, so, I officially rejoined then and there. Not long after Babs began her tenure as Oracle, and not long before she broke off the engagement. 

I finished up Team business one morning and headed over to the Gordons’ house. Barb had taken the morning off, claiming that she didn’t feel well, so I knocked and walked in to check on her. Thelma met me at the door, and gave me an apprehensive look. 

“She’s kind of having one of her Mr. Hyde Days,” she said, her voice low. “I’ve tried getting her to come out of it, but no dice.”

“Well,” I said, smiling. “I’ll take a crack at it.”

She frowned, then patted my back. “Good luck…”

I headed upstairs into Barb’s room, and when she didn’t respond to my hello, I closed the door.

“What’s going on?” I asked, sitting down on the corner of her bed and giving Foxy a pet by way of greeting. 

Babs turned her gaze to me. She was flushed to her ears, and her eyes were an incredibly bright shade of blue—yep, she was _mad._

“Gee, I don’t know,” she snapped. “Why don’t you tell me?”

I shrugged. “I have no idea. I just got here.”

“You should probably just un-get here.”

“Well, tell me what’s wrong first, and then I’ll consider it.”

“Oh, like you don’t know,” she muttered. 

I lifted my hands. “I swear, I don’t.”

“Okay. Fine. You seriously fucked Bette the night before your birthday?”

I closed my eyes, heaved a sigh, and sagged. “Oh, for God’s sake,” I mumbled, grinding my fingers into my forehead. 

“No. There’s no ‘for God’s sake’ here. What the _hell_ , Dick?”

I kept my face neutral. I mean, God, I’d completely forgotten that I’d done it with Bette the night before Babs came over to my apartment and we Did Things. That it made any difference now seemed to kind of be a joke. Barbara had never been openly upset by any of my previous forays into the budoir; I mean, if anything, she got playful and teased me about it, kind of rattling my cage here and there about my reputation with girls. When we put a title on our relationship, and she accepted my proposal, it all seemed to go by the wayside, water left under the bridge for so long that it was entirely forgotten. All womanhood outside of Babs was dead to me anyway once the title was there.

And now, how to explain this, as she sat glaring at me, her newly-cut short hair standing up in ninety-degree angles off of her head, and her glasses perched precariously on the end of her nose. Her arms were crossed over her chest, the muscles clearly defined in the light from the window. Able to use her lower body or not—she wasn’t someone you wanted to honk off. One deck to the face and you’d be likely to lose some teeth or need reconstructive surgery.

“Barb,” I said, keeping my voice even, “Bette was one time. Okay? One time. I didn’t want to think about my mom and dad on my birthday, so…” I threw my hands up. “She gave me an opening, and I just… I didn’t think, okay? I just took it. That’s all. It was just… a one-off.”

“Well, I’ll give you that, you sure as hell _didn’t_ think,” she said. “And Dick, I’m sorry, but you can’t use that whole ‘boo-hoo my parents are dead’ thing as just… like a blanket excuse to you know, go do what-the-ever-hell you feel like doing, okay? Being bereaved ten years after the fact does not give you a hall pass to be an asshole whenever you feel like it.”

“Okay—first of all, the only person who probably has any right to be calling me an asshole over this is _Bette,_ not you,” I snapped. Babs had touched a nerve. “I mean, it was one night that didn’t mean _anything_ , and it’s not exactly like I bothered to consider how she might feel about it. That’s pretty asshole-ish of me, I’ll admit that. But that aside. Second of all, _don’t._ Go there. About my parents.”

“Oh, I went there, took pictures, and plastered them all over Facebook,” she replied, adopting a falsetto, “valley girl” voice. “Hear that? That was me, impersonating _Bette._ And frankly, I’ll go there if that place needs gone to. Because apparently, no one else will!”

Clearly, there wasn’t going to be any easy arguing with her that day. I sucked in a breath, counted to five, and released it. “Okay,” I said. “Look. Let’s just not talk about that right now.”

“Why?”

“Let’s just not. And Babs, I don’t really know what else I can say here, except that I’m sorry.”

She snorted. “No, you’re not.”

“Yes, I am,” I insisted.

“Then why are you even here?”

“What do you mean?”

“Dick—” She gestured angrily. “You’re missing the point, here.”

I was getting aggravated. “What point?”

“Just—that—” She made a frustrated noise. “Okay, so we make out, and a few weeks later, you’re fucking Bette. Then, the night after, you’re deflowering me then and there like it’s next to nothing, no big deal. Then, I get hurt, and all of a sudden, it’s like you’re Super Boyfriend and want to get married and do the whole domestic thing or some crap. What am I really supposed to make of that?”

I stared at her. “Um, one—you told people we weren’t together after that same make-out session. Could have fooled me that it was any skin off your back. Two—you came _after_ Bette, who I got with thinking I was still pretty unattached, and by _your decision,_ by the way—and I haven’t been with anyone but you since. Nor have I _wanted_ to, thank you very much. Three—whether or not we were together, after you got hurt, I wouldn’t have done a single thing differently. I would have done everything exactly the same.” 

“Yeah? Why?”

“Because I love you, Barb,” I stated plainly. “And you’re my best friend, okay—whatever tack gets put on this.”

“Could you maybe get a little cornier?”

“As a matter of fact, yes, I could, if you wanted.”

“Well, I _don’t._ And I don’t want you here, p-pushing my chair, and exercising my legs, and cleaning up my _messes,_ and because—”

I waited. “…Because?”

She burst into tears. “Because you _feel sorry for me!_ ”

“I am _not_ here because I feel sorry for you,” I told her. I reached for her, but she pulled away. “Babs.”

“Just— _God._ Stop trying to inflate the size of your penis by nobly sticking by some charity case. Go pick up your stupid trophy whore Bette and have her make adorable babies and then poison you with anti-freeze to get at your life insurance.”

“Will you _please_ just forget Bette?” I snapped. “Look. It happened, and I’m sorry. But I can’t _un_ happenit.Either way, Babs, it doesn’t matter now—I love you, and I’m in this for _good._ Okay?”

“Yeah, whatever,” she grumbled. “Let me ask you something, did you make me the butt end of a locker room joke in the Watchtower the day after?” She adopted a sing-song voice. “Oh, hi, I’m Nightwing, I’m such a stud I got Batgirl’s V-Card, nyeh-nyeh.”

“Is that really what I sound like?” I asked, deadpan, trying to lighten the mood, and failing. I sighed. “Babs, I didn’t say a word to anyone. I mean… well, I think I might have said something about it to M’gann, but that’s just because I was _happy.”_

She was quiet a second, staring out the window. “I’m done talking about this.” She pressed a hand to her face. “And knowing that, for as long as I’m with you, I have to worry about where you’ve been, and everything you say. And… everything else. I’m just done.” She looked over at me, then sighed. “…It’s over.”

She might as well have shot me in the chest. “…You don’t mean that.”

“Yes, I do.” She sniffed, and wiped at her nose. 

“…What do you need me to do, Babs? Look, I don’t care _what_ it is—you tell me, and I’ll do it. I’ll let Poison Ivy plow me with a fourteen-inch strap-on and get it on video and put it on Youtube. I’ll run naked across Rimbor and claim that Peter Pan stole my shadow. I’ll climb fucking Mount Everest with a rubber band and a toothpick wearing nothing but a _thong_ if that’s what you want.” 

She shook her head. “…Dick. _Please_ just get out of my room.” She squeezed her fingers in her hair. “I just… I just need some space. Okay?”

Her voice was small, drained, tired. I sat, staring helplessly, feeling as though I had something inside of me that disappeared, and left a weight greater than I could carry in its absence. 

“Barbara,” I said. “Just. Tell me what you want to me to do.”

She didn’t reply, just stared out the window. 

“We can—”

“Dick.” She turned, and looked at me. Her eyes glistened. “Please just leave. It’ll be better for both of us. Just. _Please_ go.”

I stood mutely, numbly, and did as she asked. I bumped into Mrs. Gordon at the foot of the stairs, and couldn’t even bring myself to speak to her before I headed outside. I just shook my head, muttered something I can’t even remember at this point, and left.

In the garden at Wayne Manor, I startled awake at about 4 that afternoon when my phone rang. I didn’t even realize I’d fallen asleep with the painful assault of memories on replay. I recognized the number from the doctor’s office, and, with a tightening around my chest, I answered the phone. 

“Hi, is this Richard?” A girl’s voice. 

“Uh, yeah,” I said, still kind of waking up. I rose, and leaned my back against the trunk of the tree. 

“This is Anselma from Dr. Cross’ office,” she continued.

“Oh, hi,” I said, probably in a voice friendlier than necessary.

“Hi,” she said with a chuckle. “How are you today?”

“Um, good?” I said. “Guess that remains to be seen…” 

“Yeah…” She trailed off briefly. “Well, the test results came back, both from your blood work and from your bone marrow extraction, and I’m really sorry to have to tell you this, being a stranger and everything, and over the phone to boot, but… both came up with acute myeloid leukemia, stage 4A, meaning it’s spread to your lymph nodes. Dr. Cross found some indicators that it’s spread farther than that, so the next step is to come in and have some tests performed to see if that’s the case. After that, you’ll be meeting with an oncology team, you know, to determine what your options are, what kind of treatment you want to receive, whether or not you want to partake in a clinical trial, so on.”

I sat, the trunk of the tree rough against my back. The hot, humid air felt suddenly impossible to insufflate. 

“Dr. Cross has already referred you to a partner of his in oncology, Dr. Therese Steenburgen,” Anselma was saying, “so you’ll need to call her office to set up an appointment with her.”

I listened as she rattled off the number, and once I got her off the phone, I punched the digits into the keypad, and then, instead of hitting the “call” prompt, I stared at the screen, my thumb unmoving. 

Acute. Myeloid. Leukemia.

Stage 4A. 

So something _was_ wrong. 

Mechanically, I thumbed the “call” prompt, got in touch with Steenburgen’s office, and got shuffled around to set up appointments for PET scans, chest X-rays, biopsies, and a lumbar puncture. Then, I lay down on my back, and watched the late afternoon sun glide over the remaining arch of blue sky until it dipped behind the trees that framed Wayne Manor. I don’t think I moved once. 

Alfred called me inside at around 7, and I robotically made my way into the house. Shutting the door behind me, I looked up as Alfred approached me.

“Master Richard,” he said, “if you don’t mind my asking, has the doctor’s office been in touch with you yet?”

I nodded. My voice seemed to duck down and crouch inside my chest. 

“Well, what was the news, sir?” he asked. 

My stomach was beginning to ache again, the effects of the pain pills having long passed and the initial shock of the results beginning to sink into my brain, my chest, my gut. 

“…Not good,” I told him, my voice seeming to come from somewhere far away. “Acute myeloid leukemia, stage 4A, apparently…”

Alfred inclined his head, and gave me a look, one of a sort of unjudging, unpitying, I Genuinely Give a Crap brand of compassion. 

“Come,” he said, “let us find Master Bruce.”

I stood right where I was, momentarily seized in a state of suspended animation, frozen beneath the onslaught of thoughts. 

“Master Richard?”

I blinked. “What?”

Alfred didn’t speak, simply reached out, and grasped my shoulder. I continued to stand, feeling my breath coming faster, and my heart beating more insistently in my chest. 

I took a breath, and anchored myself. 

“Okay,” I said, finally. I ran a hand over my hair, and realized that, if I had to go through chemotherapy, I would not be doing that again, not for a long time, or if ever. It was a weird feeling. It’s not that I was afraid of being bald, but I would have liked some say in the matter. 

Bruce took the news with his usual flat-mannered, stoic, inscrutable mien, which, in some odd way, was comforting. Given the tumultuous storm-at-sea that was my own crashing teem of emotions, Bruce’s steadiness was something I needed every bit as much as I needed air. I knew, being as close to him as I was, that in his own manner, he took it hard, but the fact that this didn’t show, and he approached me no differently than before, solidified just how _much_ I needed him. 

However, another part of me didn’t want to trouble him with the inconveniences of this situation—he had enough to deal with as it was, and frankly, I did, too. Two men stressed to high hell in close proximity to the other sounded like a terrible idea, so, rather than risk straining things at a time during which they could least afford to be so, I left him out of the whole cancer thing, at least for then. 

I got the PET scans, chest X-rays, biopsies, and lumbar punctures done. I ended my leave of absence, then trained with Rose, and went on a mission to Atlantis to track a lead regarding inside intel on the League being leaked to Darkseid. Nothing like discovering an Atlantian Judas in your midst— _Garth_ of all people was convinced to sell out to Apokaliptian forces when they made continued false promises to him to return Tula from the grave with the use of the Anti-Life Equation. That Tula, through this particular Lazarusine method, would return as a mindless zombie—complete with crumbling bones and tooth decay—seemed to escape Garth’s already scant attention. He still grieved desperately and was willing to grasp at any miracle, even one that would betray his friends, destroy Atlantis, and endanger the whole of the earth. It all sounds terrible, but I completely understood where he was coming from. I understood him _so_ well that it hurt. Losing my parents, then Jason, then Tula—it was all bad enough. Losing Wally—I might have been willing to listen to the false promises of the Anti-Life Equation. After he died, my life got a little erratic—I had trouble sleeping due to an unceasing spate of bad dreams, I couldn’t concentrate on reading or even on TV for longer than a few minutes at a throw, and I noticed my appetite and work-outs were suffering. Dinah, when Bruce forced me to see her in those first horrible weeks after he died, said I was depressed—as in for-real depressed. She even suggested Zoloft, but I stuck with the nutraceuticals she gave me, figuring I'd turn to the Zoloft if the sessions and supplements didn't help in the end. And now, even though it hurt just as badly as it did when we first learned he was gone, I had at least begun to figure out how to coexist with that pain. 

When we detained Garth, I spent a long time talking to him, explaining all of this. I don’t know if it helped him any, but talking about it with him _did_ help me some. So, when I made it back up to the surface, unsuited, hit the showers, and discovered that I had a missed call and voicemail on my phone, I was calm and level when I rang Cross’ office.

“Dick, are you sitting down?” he asked, first thing after I got him on the phone. 

I was not—in fact, I was standing in the institutional main room of the Team’s site in Bludhaven, not ten feet around the corner from where my teammates got dressed and discussed Garth in hushed voices. 

“No,” I said. “Should I be?”

“Maybe.”

There were no benches nearby, unless I sat down with the rest of the team. I remained standing. 

“Okay, then,” I said, “sitting. Sorry I missed your call.”

“No problem.” He audibly sighed. “Well, Dick, the results are back.”

“And?”

“Well… I’m afraid it’s not good.”

I froze. “How not good? Can you tell me over the phone?”

“Yes. There’s no sugarcoating this, so I won’t. There is cancer growth that has spread inoperably to your pancreas, to your spleen—which as an aside we could remove, but such a procedure could actually endanger your life unnecessarily at this time—and to your blood. I understand that… this must be very shocking to hear. I’m very sorry.”

Just hearing “pancreas” seemed to put a cap on time flow. I stood completely still, aware of the humming sound from the overhead lights, and the whispered voices of my teammates a little ways away.

“Do I have long?” I asked, keeping my voice as low as possible. It wasn’t very hard to do. 

“With treatment, you may conceivably have about three to four months. Possibly, there is a particular option that you might consider, that could buy you a little more time. Are you familiar with Star Labs?”

“Yeah. Bruce funds some of their research.”

“Right, so I’ve heard. Okay. Well… A certain biological researcher there, a Dr. Stone, has developed a new, synthetic compound that has shown promise in killing cancer cells at a faster and more consistent rate than traditional chemotherapy drugs. I do not believe that, in your case, it will provide a _cure,_ but it will certainly extend your life significantly and help to combat the pain you’re in. And certain gene therapy drugs have been effective against blood cancers and certain forms of lymphoma, so that is worth consideration, as well. With these medications in conjunction with the usual chemotherapy drugs, you could be looking at maybe six months versus three.”

 _Six months._ Wally had died longer than six months before. It seemed like last week. “…Okay.”

“We can obviously discuss this in more detail at our next appointment,” said Cross, “during which we can meet with Stone and his team, Steenburgen, and representatives from the ACS to go over this new course of treatment and what you can expect from it. It’s there that you can make your decision as to whether or not it’s something you wish to consider with seriousness. The date that has been discussed between us is tomorrow at 3:30. I apologize for the short notice, but is that a time that works for you?”

“Yeah… sure. I mean, that’s fine.”

“Good,” said Cross. “The meeting will be in Conference Room AC at Gotham General, in the Cancer Care Unit.”

“Okay.”

“I’m very sorry… Richard.”

Without taking an active notice of having done so, I had gone completely numb, inside my body and out. My breath moved consistently, rhythmically, through my chest, my heartbeat fueling it. Why I still breathed, why my heart worked at all, seemed a mystery, when everything else inside me was breaking down.

I didn’t reply, just unfeelingly ended the call, and barely noticed when the phone slipped out of my fingers to clatter to the floor. 

I started when Virgil turned the corner, and saw me standing there, the cell phone on the floor by my unmoving Converse. 

“You okay, dude?” he asked. “You see a ghost or something?”

I shook my head. 

“What?” I said.

“Uh… well, you’re white as a sheet, and you dropped your phone.” He stared at me. “…You okay?”

I pulled my crap together and nodded. “Yeah… sorry. This whole thing with Garth, and… Thought I bombed an exam. Didn’t, though.”

He made a face at me and laughed. “Wow— _not_ bombing an exam is enough to make you look like you just got a call from beyond the grave and drop your phone? Man, I wish I put that much stock in my schoolwork…”

I bent, and picked up the phone. “Yeah, just… The professor’s a jerk-off. Thought I cheated. Anyway. Got to go deal with that…” _And other things._ “See you later.”

I left the building. I wandered home, slowly, my footfalls mechanically carrying me up the steps to my apartment. When I got inside, I shut the door with a sepulchral thud, and leaned my back against it. I stood there for a moment, staring at the floor as I waited for the feeling to return to my arms, legs, toes, fingers. My stomach hurt. My head hurt. How much of it was training, how much of it was field work, I couldn’t say. Equally, I couldn’t say how much of it was this settlement of unwanted newcomers that had furtively established residence inside my body.

 _Just call it what it is,_ a snide voice griped at me from within my own brain, _cancer. It’s cancer. You have cancer. You’ve had cancer. You’ve ignored cancer. And now, you’ll die of cancer. It’s the cancer that will get you. No Darkseid, no Savage, no Joker, no Reach, no Zucco, no EMF._

I slid down to the floor, and I drew my legs up into my aching abdomen. I rested my forehead on my knees, and sat there, methodically breathing until my trembling abated, until my heart stopped whalloping in my chest, until my head cleared enough to start thinking. 

Six months.

Half a year of life remained ahead of me—if I was lucky. 

Obviously, the big question was: What did I do in the meantime?

I stood, and made my way over to the couch to collapse atop it. I was freezing. Grabbing the throw blanket, festooned with _The Mario Brothers_ (a hand-made gift from Zatanna about ten thousand years ago, it seemed), I tossed it across my legs. 

First things first. Get all the crap cleared out of the air. I had done a lot of things in my day that I wasn’t proud of.

Second, get the crap in order, and go over will and insurance type things with Bruce.

Speaking of Bruce, third. How in the world I was going to tell him about this…

Fourth, be ready to fight. I had no intention of just rolling over.

But, fifth, get ready for it.

I wasn’t so much afraid to die, as I was afraid of the logistics of living while dying. I couldn’t help but notice, after Jason passed, and then Wally, that people oftentimes tend to attribute more attachment to a person in death than they did in life. For Wally and Jason, it shone through in their civilian friends, rather than in our teammates. On my end, though, I had, again, done a lot of things that I was _not_ proud of. By my team, my friends, myself. When I discussed what I was going through with Dinah in those sessions after Wally died, she told me that, alongside his death, a lot of my issues stemmed from guilt—and that this guilt contributed strongly to my feeling the need to go on hiatus from the team for a time. And honestly, I knew she was right. I was ashamed—deeply ashamed—of what I had done, to the point that I didn’t want to show my face in that Watchtower for a while. It had seemed justified and forgivable at the time, since I had done what I felt was necessary, but on some deeper level I knew all too well that I was doing everything that, when I was thirteen, I had vowed _never_ to do—to think like, and _be,_ Batman. And now that I was sick— _really_ sick, I didn’t want my teammates, many of whom had kept me at arms’ length at best since those months spent in battle against the Reach invasion, to just up and pretend that everything was suddenly all gravy just because I was _battling cancer_ , and regard me as some kind of pitiable saint—all because you simply do not lambast a person who _has cancer_. It doesn’t matter whatthey’ve done, what pain they’ve caused, what hurt they’ve imparted. No—you pet them, you praise them, you raise money to donate to funding research in their honor, you run marathons with their names on your tee-shirt. My fists balled up under the blanket. 

I was sick because I didn’t get off of Apokalips in time, and I didn’t follow up on that—my own damn fault. I did some really horrible things to my friends and teammates because I was so singlemindedly focused on seeing to the end the job of halting the Light and the Reach in their plans—to hell with how everyone would feel about it at the end of the day, if it stopped the invasion. And this absurd, appalling idea that, after everything I had done, my teammates would turn on their heels to give me a bunch of echoing bagpipes and tearful, romanticized accolades and drink champagne to my bravery and set up a holograph of me looking all noble and heroic in the grotto just seemed like a veritable mountain of absolute, unstomachable bullshit. I wasn’t a hero—at all. I felt like I might get sick, so I chucked the blanket, made my way into the bathroom, and hovered over the toilet. Sweat dripped down my face, letting go of my skin to create little ripples in the water. I watched, fascinated.

Suddenly, Artemis’ voice.

_Wait…Where’s Wally…_

Yep, up it came. 

When I was done, I slowly stood, every movement weak and shaky, and rinsed my mouth with Listerine. I wandered back over to the couch to lie down beneath the blanket. Pulling my phone back out of my pocket, I sent a group text to Conner, Kaldur, Artemis, and M’gann—the founding team members. 

_Who’s up for surfing Saturday if things stay quiet and the weather holds?_

Artemis replied first.

_Just us?_

I replied.

_Yeah. Old times kind of thing._

_Buzz._ From Artemis.

_Let’s do it! Happy Harbor?_

I thumbed in my next reply.

_Sure thing… Say 9am?_

Then, from M’gann.

_Conner and I are in. :-) 9am sounds great._

Finally, Kaldur.

_I can ensure unprecedented swells._

I smiled, and when Artemis confirmed the time to be okay for her, I wrapped up the conversation. I thought about calling Babs, but I really had no idea what to say. What the heck _does_ a person say in a situation like that, anyway? “Oh, hey, nothing’s up, just dying, wanted to hear your voice in my last moments!” The sad part was—that was the honest truth. I just wanted to hear her voice. 

Instead, I turned on the TV,and fell asleep on the couch. 

The following day, at this appointment with Dr. Stone and his team (funnily, I remembered seeing his son Vic at Mathletes Nationals in Calculus some years before, and he was there at this meeting), the ACS reps, Dr. Steenburgen, and Dr. Cross, I couldn’t help but feel a little uneasy. I had spent the morning looking over what alternative options I might have, just in case I had missed something somewhere (alien or magical remedies, for example), but my search had turned up nothing that would help. And now, the almost _hungry_ expressions on the faces of the Star Labs researchers insistently reminded me that, to them, I was nothing more than a subject in an ongoing experiment—a living ledger that would compile data for them. 

After basic introductions and a discussion as to what was going on with me and what traditional treatment options had to offer, Dr. Stone stood up to deliver a compelling speech about the benefits of his experimental compounds that had already shown promise in lab tests. Allegedly, they killed cancer cells at a rate nearly twice as fast as that of broad-usage chemotherapy drugs, meaning that yes, my current prognosis of three months with heavy chemo and gene therapy meds would be extended to about six, maybe more. There was, however, absolutely no chance of a cure, according to every doctor and scientist in the room. My last, tiny shred of hope seemed to contract into a droplet of condensation on the outside of my glass of ice water, then trickle slowly to the surface of the table, and, finally, evaporate. 

_It’s an experimental drug,_ I reminded myself, _don’t get dismayed yet. Get ’mayed. Keep hoping._

“While there is the benefit of your life lasting considerably longer, and possibly with far less pain, there are some potential side effects that have been evidenced in our research, consistent with those seen in chemotherapy,” Stone was saying, drawing up a new slide in his presentation, “for example, nausea and vomiting, sores on the insides of the mouth, nose and ears, itching and peeling of the skin, and, swollen and bleeding gums, hair loss, a strong possibility of sterility and impotence, and finally fatigue and some fogginess or an inability to concentrate.” 

I’d been tortured, stabbed, shot, beaten. Regardless, even by my standards, this list was fairly unpalatable.

Dr. Cross then went on to explain that even the most generous health insurance company (ha, ha) might have pause in covering such an experimental clinical trial, and detailed the expenditures should the company refuse coverage, which it likely would. 

(I had an oddly dissociated thought regarding this—doing the math in my head, if I bit it after six months per the expectation, the money wouldn’t be a problem, but if the weird drug worked better than anticipated, it might start to hurt even Bruce’s vast interests after a few years. So, okay, I didn’t want to just flop on my back and _die,_ but I didn’t want to see Bruce stretched too thin, either. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to keel over within the specified parameters.) 

I realized suddenly that every eye in the room was focused on me.

“Richard?”

“Sorry, what?” I asked. 

“Are you willing to partake in the trial?” 

I paused for a moment.

“Umm… Well, if I decline the trial,” I said, “and, let’s say, all other treatment options, how long will I have?”

There was a moment of silence as Cross gazed at me like a somber Buddha. 

“Not long,” he said bluntly. “Dick. You are dying already. You are dying as surely as I am standing here speaking to you. If you decline treatment, I would give you four weeks at the most. It is not in your best interest—or in the best interest of your loved ones—to refuse treatment at this time.”

I shifted a little in my chair. “It sounds like the treatment might not be in the best interest of my loved ones, either, though,” I said.

“Why do you say that?” Stone asked me, frowning.

“Well, if the insurance won’t cover it, and frankly, I’m guessing they won’t, and it works better than you anticipated, I don’t want to leave my foster dad with mounds of debt when he’s used to having his interests in order,” I stated. “It also sounds like it comes with a set of symptoms all on its own, and frankly, if this is something that’s going to require the same amount of care for twice the duration of time or more… It’s just—something to think about, I guess.”

Cross gave me a look that stalled any other attempt to speak. “Richard. You truly have no idea whatthis is doing to your foster father, do you?”

It occurred to me that maybe I didn’t. Bruce always seemed so indomitable—as though nothing, be it hell, high water, bloodthirsty alien tyrants, terminal cancer, whatever, could make him so much as twitch. I dimly remembered some quote from somewhere, “The things that we fear the most, have already happened to us.” For him, I would imagine this to be true—and it was as though that horror in the alley took from him all ability to truly open himself up to _feeling_ forever. Although he was distraught over Jason, he somehow remained serene and collected, even as _I_ lost my shit. When I informed him of the leukemia, he had levelly told me to rest, stay on leave, and keep him informed. Then, he had promptly moved on to discussing Darkseid’s plans to betray the Light and take the earth by force. While sure, I knew that he wrangled with it _somewhere_ in there, maybe he took it harder than I suspected.

“Speaking of that,” said Cross before I could reply, “why is he not here? You _are_ still on his health insurance?”

I nodded, and ran a hand over my face. “Yeah… I just… didn’t want to burden him with this quite yet. At least, not until I knew what the options were.”

“You won’t be able to hide it from him forever,” Steenburgen suddenly chimed in, “or even for long. And if you opt for this experimental treatment, you’ll need at least _someone._ You won’t be receiving it at home, as you will have to be on location here to be observed by Stone and his team, and we have been advised against releasing trial recipients to drive after treatment.”

I sat in silence, watching the glass of water sweat onto the table. 

“It doesn’t do, Richard,” she continued, “to hide from others when you sorely need help. Some burdens must be shared if they are to be carried at all.”

I knew she was right—on all accounts. If I didn’t get help, I’d be dead in a month or less, and regardless of imagining that I would be sparing everybody a lot of trouble by going against every fiber of my being and not fighting this thing, I would, in truth, leave a big wreck for everyone to deal with. If I got treatment, and do what I was born to do (i.e. fight), maybe I’d have some chance at damage control. 

I sighed, heavily.

“Okay,” I said. “Okay, I’ll do it.”

I’ve never seen such a smug, satisfied look on the face of anyone than I did on the face of Stone in that moment.

Saturday, surfing day, came after what seemed an endless, otherworldly sojourn in a doorless room not subject to the earthly laws of time. That morning dawned hazy, humid, and yellow-bright,with hot, whipping gusts of wind that punctuated the blaze of the early sunlight. Surfing looked promising. I got to the site at Happy Harbor early, and given that all of us had our own gear, I sat on the beach, where I watched the surf and waited for the others. The marks on my legs and shoulders had faded, and although I had some bruises and red spots here and there, they were at least not in such proliferation that I couldn’t explain them away. 

Monday was the day I would start the treatment. This surfing venture, I decided, was to be something of a last hurrah before things got overly complicated. I didn’t feel like surfing—didn’t feel much like moving at all, in fact—but I wanted to at least try to have some fun before I was stuck full of tubes to the end of pumping me full of poisons that would kill a massive amount of my body’s cells along with the cancer, and also before I finally gave my friends an upfront, sincere apology for my actions the year before. Maybe, if spirits were high and guards were low, they’d be more inclined to genuinely get past things, and that same forgiveness would be catching among the rest of the team. It would be a lot easier to face treatment, knowing that I’d found absolution.

I had told Bruce the truth about the prognosis just before a mission to interfere with attempted espionage on the part of our enemies, and Cross was right—I hadn’t had any idea what this was doing to him. The one person you will never learn emotion from is Bruce, and I’ve accepted that. But, after I gave him the prognosis and what I planned to do about it, he had expressed an awful lot of feeling, at least by his standards. I had a moment, after he expounded at me about how I needed to take better care of myself and realize that I was human and had limitations and the like, that I desperately wanted to reach out to him and seek the embrace that I badly needed, and had not elicited, from _anyone_ thus far. He offered to drive me to treatment, and although I had already enlisted Alfred to take me, I said okay. 

My friends filtered onto the beach. I was happy to see them, but I had to adopt a façade of good humor and excitement as we said our hellos. Guilt is a bad enough feeling. Still worse, is knowing that that same guilt is well-deserved, and that the time to own up to your sins has, at last, come. Equally, harboring a secret as big as the one I carried sucked. I wanted support, but was afraid to seek it.

We surfed for a while, but I withdrew after getting up on the board a few times, owing to just feeling too damn tired and weak to repeatedly paddle around—sitting up on the board was a freaking challenge. I sprawled out on my back just at the edge of the surf, where I rested and watched the puffy, billowing cumulus clouds build in the sky. I’ll admit readily to enjoying skygazing, stargazing, and the like. I love how the vista is always changing.

I worried that Babs might be hurt that I didn’t invite her out to at least join us—it wasn’t like she couldn’t hang out on the beach, or stay afloat using her upper body in deeper water with one of us spotting her (in fact, that was good for her), but I also figured that if I explained my reasoning for orchestrating this outing, she’d probably understand. Out of all of my friends, she was the only one I’d shared my guilt with. I found myself regretting not asking her to come along, missing her something awful, and wondering if she was out with Douchebag Beard. 

I smiled and looked over as Artemis suddenly came up, dropped her board, and sat down beside me. 

“Hey. Why aren’t you out there surfing?” she asked. 

“Just not feeling all that great,” I replied. “Summer cold.”

“Ahhh… and now I have to quote _The Stand,”_ she said. “‘Summer colds… those are the worst.’ Lian's had one that's lasted for a month now.”

“Yep, they suck,” I said, closing my eyes and wishing I just had a summer cold.

“So, uh… I have kind of an awkward, random question for you,” she said, looking down at me. 

I opened my eyes and held her gaze. “Okay? I have an awkward, random answer. What’s up?”

“Uh… Are you and Babs still going to Mal and Karen’s wedding together?”

I sighed, and shook my head. “No. She’s going with Captain Douchebag Beard. _Stephen._ ”

She gave me a half-smile. “I’m sorry.” She issued an uncomfortable, huffing laugh. “God, that’s messed up.”

I looked over at her. “Dude. I know, right?”

She made a face. “Yeah. _Not._ Cool. I really don’t know what Babs is thinking.”

I sighed. “Yeah, well, my history isn’t exactly spotless, either, and she’s got a load of crap to deal with right now, annnnd she’s a big girl and can make her own decisions, so…” I laid a hand on my aching forehead. “Can’t really hold it against her, I guess.”

Artemis was smiling at me, kind of a sympathetic expression. “Sounds like you’ve already talked yourself through this one.”

“Oh, a million times, at least.”

“Well, you and I have already discussed your uhhh—history.”

I nodded. “Yes, we have.”

“And you know my feelings on it.”

Her feelings on my “history” were far from bad, and mirrored Dinah’s own explanation for my juvenile misdeeds. I gave her a warm look. “Yes, I do.”

“And, uh… speaking of that same history,” said Artemis. She looked out over the water, watching the other three as they surfed. Kaldur crafted an impressive wave for Conner and M’gann that sent both of them under. She sighed, and looked down at me. “This might be a little weird, but did you want to go to Karen and Mal’s wedding with me? You know, be each other’s plus-ones?”

I raised my eyebrows at her and gave her a languid grin. “Are you asking me on a _date_?”

“What? No!”

“And I mean… if you are,” I continued, ignoring her, “shouldn’t you be a little more discreet?”

She slapped my arm. “I am _not_ asking you on a date,” she said.

“Aw, c’mon…”

“ _N. O_ ,” she laughed. 

“D – r – a – g…”

“S – o – r –r – y…”

“I’m just kidding,” I said, chuckling and holding my hands up. “You’re my best friend’s girl friend. _Way_ off-limits.”

“Yeah. Way inappropriate. Which is why I’m asking you as friends,” she said. “I’m just… well, speaking of history.”

“You don’t want to be reminded of Wally there,” I said. “I get it, Artemis. It’s okay.” 

“Yeah.” She looked so broken and sad in that moment that I reached out and patted her hand. She smiled at me.

“Well, I’m not real thrilled about the prospect of having to face Babs’ new boyfriend either, so you’ve got a deal,” I said, closing my eyes again. “We should have a safe word. Like if things get too uncomfortable, we shout the safe word at each other and just bail and get drunk somewhere else.”

“Oh my God—” Artemis started laughing, “safe phrase—we’ll laugh about this someday!”

I cracked up, too, but had a thought that maybe I shouldn’t have accepted her invitation, since I probably wouldn’t be there by the time the wedding rolled around. Oops.

“So… is ‘creet’ the opposite of discreet?” I said, instead of withdrawing my agreement. “Think that could be part of the etymology behind the word ‘cretin,’ beyond it originally being suspected as coming from ‘creta,’ ‘cretira,’ ‘cretine,’ etc.? Maybe part of being a cretin versus say, being an idiot involves never being discreet about it… hence, creet, cretin.”

She was laughing. “Dick, I love you, you know that? You always make me feel better.”

I arched a brow. “Wait a sec—you _love_ me? And yet you creetly indicated that this wasn’t to be a date.”

She slugged me again. “It’s _not.”_

“Ow,” I said, laughing. “Fine, have it your way.”

“Well, thank you _so_ much for saying you’ll go with me. Seriously—life-saver.” She rose to her feet. “I’m going to keep surfing, so…” 

“I’m just going to keep staring at the sky,” I responded, lying back. “Fascinating this time of day…”

“I’m sure,” she chuckled. “Seriously, this was your idea—so surf. You’ve never let a summer cold keep you from anything before.”

“Yeah, okay. I’ll be right there.”

I watched as she attached the tether to her ankle, and walked out to paddle into the waves. 

Great. I had set out to perform some damage control. And now, all I had done was create _more_ damage. I closed my eyes.

“Wasn’t it your idea to come surfing?”

Conner’s voice broke into my thoughts. I cracked open an eye, and sat up. Time to talk.

“Yeah,” I said, “among other things.”

“Other things?”

I sighed and nodded. “I actually wanted to talk to you about something.”

“All of us, or me specifically?”

“Well, all of you, really, but I can do it on an individual basis.”

He frowned down at me. “Okay. What is it?”

“It might take a while, so…” I gestured. “Want to sit?”

His frown deepened, but he sat.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. 

“Just…” I said. I took a breath. “Listen, I’ve been thinking.” 

Conner stared at me expectantly, silently waiting for me to continue. I hadn’t plotted my words out much, and I struggled for a second with what to say, and how to say it.

“I’m really sorry,” I said, finally, having little else to offer.

“Sorry—for what?” he asked.

“Just… you know, for everything I did, last year. I don’t think I ever really apologized for it.”

“Is _that_ what this is about? Getting us all together so you can say sorry for how you led the team?”

I nodded. _Sort of…_ “Yeah, pretty much.”

He sighed, and looked out over the water for such a long time I started to wonder if he’d lost track of what we were talking about while he watched M’gann. Finally, he turned his gaze back to me.

“Okay, look,” he said gruffly. “I’m not going to pretend that I wasn’t angry. _Really_ angry. But I think you and I both know—and me probably more than you—that it doesn’t really do anyone any good to hold onto anger.”

I nodded, staring at the sand, saying nothing.

“Yeah, okay, I _wanted_ to pound you,” he admitted. “But I didn’t _—_ and here’s why. I thought about it—if I was going to come after you, I’d have to confront Kaldur, Artemis, and Wally, too. They were just as responsible for the whole thing as you were. Team effort, right?”

I stared at him for a second, and nodded.

“Get over yourself,” he said, and when he smiled, I, disarmed, smiled, too. “If you’re apologizing, so should they. I mean, Wally let Artemis’ _mother_ believe she had died.” He shook his head. “Pretty heavy. But—although I personally still feel you could have trusted us even with something that delicate, I understand now that you withheld that information out of the intention to _protect_ us. All of us. Kaldur, Artemis, the whole team. I mean, if we were all in on it…” He, again, shook his head. “Too many things could have gone wrong.”

“Doesn’t make it right, though,” I sighed. “I endangered everyone on the team, in the end.”

“Well, sure, but there was no way you could have known that it would backfire,” said Conner. “Looking back, it’s easy to think you should have seen it coming, but…”

“Hindsight’s twenty-twenty,” I agreed. “Foresight’s blind.”

“Exactly.” He looked over at me. “You’re forgiven, by the way. By everyone. You’re our friend, Dick. There was really no need to call us all together to apologize.”

I shook my head, grinding up a handful of wet sand in my fist. “It just feels sometimes like the others kind of look at me differently now. And… like _bad_ different.”

He shrugged. “Well, sure they do. You were Wally’s best friend—and that’s just the truth, that title can’t go to anyone else on the team. And you quit after he disappeared. It’s more… not knowing how to approach you? Kind of… tip-toeing around what to say and what not to say. Particularly with the newer recruits.”

I stared at him, floored. “Is that really what it is?” 

He nodded. “We’ve all talked about it. Not to go talking behind your back or anything, but… Guess it happens, talking. When someone’s gone. Everyone and everything gets talked about.”

I felt overwhelmed with an unspeakable relief, and, with a suddenness, a quote that I had come upon reading for my English Lit course the autumn before seized my mind.

“Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee,” I said.

He smiled. “John Donne?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I remember reading that back in the fall, and it reminding me of why you, Kaldur, Wally and I all started this team in the first place.” I sighed. “I guess reading that was the first time I felt a little pulled to come back. Even if it wasn’t the same without Wally, and even if I thought people didn’t want me around for a while.”

He stared down at me, his expression unusually tranquil. “Wasn’t the case, Dick. At all.”

Although the pain from my newfound affliction was still present, I felt as though my entire system had been plunged, ridding it of the burgeoning, putrid clogs that had weighted my body for months. I looked out over the ocean, feeling a little less sickened by the idea of how the others would respond to what the future held. I still didn’t feel like a hero, or like I had done things right. But I was comforted in knowing that the others felt a little differently about me than I thought.

“So,” Conner said, “you surfing, or what?”

I shook my head, wondering if I should just tell Conner then and there about the cancer thing. I was attempting a path of greater openness, after all. 

Instead, I said, “I’ll catch up in a bit.”

He nodded. “All right.”

He turned, and headed into the water. I can’t say why I chickened out. Thousands of reasons were available to me, but it wasn’t like I could have expressed them in that moment. Rather, it was as though my throat had my voice under arrest. I watched them, my friends, for a while, then put in a few more efforts to ride the swells that Kaldur created. Paddling even a little ways left me with the sense that my arms had been replaced with boneless sacks, so, I quit after a few waves, and rested on the shore until the others were ready to pack it in.

Lunch afterward was difficult. I found myself continually absorbed in thought, losing track of the conversations at hand. I was locked in a struggle against the whole Hamlet-esque struggle of To Tell or Not To Tell. Finally, I gave up, said I was tired and not feeling well, and headed back to Wayne Manor. Bruce had asked if I wanted to stay there after I told him the prognosis, and I had agreed to it. I really didn’t feel like being alone during my off-hours, and yes—I specifically wanted to be around Bruce. I wasn’t sure what to do with my apartment.

Prior to surfing day, I had remained on duty, and had monitored a couple of field missions to keep an eye on Rose, sort of to ensure that she didn’t go Vlad the Impaler on her opponents and that she wasn’t picking fights with Tim. It was tough going—not wanting to get too friendly with the narcotic pain killers that Cross had prescribed me to cope with the stomach and bone pain prior to the experimental treatment, I had been holding off on them, and every mission was something akin to getting dragged facefirst through the smoldering, coal-spitting blanket of muck on the floor of Hell. Saturday, I had been tired. Monday, I was exhausted—and ready for a few days’ rest.

Bruce had practically been AWOL in the days leading up to Monday after I gave him the news, and when I asked Alfred after where he was, he had said that he was under the impression that Bruce was on a bit of a quest, although he had not specified the nature of his ventures. Curious, I sneaked into the Bat Cave to poke around a bit and see if I could turn up any clues. 

What I found positively floored me. By all the evidence I got from busting into his machine, and going through his heavily locked-down ledgers (I’ll take a bow here and congratulate myself on being the only person who can break into Bruce’s stuff without getting caught), he had traveled to Thenagar—and by the notes tacked onto the pages of the documents printed from his computers, he had sought a cure for (you guessed it) cancer.

I blinked, saw that he had not found anything (just as I hadn’t), and, going through the next packet and coinciding document on his machine, discovered that he apparently was now visiting Amazon. Risky business, that. On his personal computer, he had entered into a data table an annotated list of places he apparently planned on beseeching, some of which I hadn’t actually considered—New Genesis and Lex freaking Luthor, for example. Humbled, I banished all signs of my having trespassed into Bruce’s private mission, and left the Bat Cave, visited with a profound feeling of Warm Fuzzies for my foster dad. 

I made my way into my bedroom, dwelling on the fact that Bruce had always Been There and Shown Up when I needed him. Thinking on this, I turned up the first thing that he ever gave me—an old, dog-eared, paperback copy of _Watership Down._ I studied it for a moment, remembering when he gave it to me, and why. 

“I lost my parents to a crime, too, Dick,” he had said in his flat, monotone voice. He stood, a towering, intimidating, burly giant—bigger, even, than my own sizable dad had been—in front of me just after my first steps inside Wayne Manor. “I don’t know if you’re aware of that.”

I had shaken my head, surprised by this information. I couldn’t help myself as I took in the sight of the sprawling grandeur of the mansion—my new home. Just the entryway was bigger than my family’s trailer at the circus had been.

“They were shot by a mugger in an alley. I was there—I saw it happen. I was your age,” he continued.

I had stared at the floor, and fiddled with the St. Christopher medal my mom had given me just before she and my dad both died (and I still wear.) “It was my mother’s—it’s St. Christopher, you see? He’ll keep you safe,” she had said, her beautiful eyes, the same I would see looking back at me from the mirror every day, crinkling at the corners, and kissed my forehead. It had worked, apparently. But one thing it _didn’t_ do was keep a person safe from heartache. 

When I looked up, I saw that Bruce held out a book. Rabbits adorned the cover. I took it from him, and studied it.

“This book… It helped me through that time,” he said. “I’d like you to have it, okay?”

I had nodded wordlessly, and clutched it as he introduced me to Alfred. 

Now, holding it, I felt like a child with a security item, and inhaled its old, familiar scent. I cracked it open for the nth time, and read until I dozed off.

Bruce, come Monday, when he finally showed back up at home, looked about as haggard and dragged out as I felt. Worse yet, he was taking a palmful of ibuprofen tablets and chasing them with coffee—never a good sign. He dismissed my concern, though, and we headed to the appointment together. We were both off-duty for the remainder of the day, and with what I had discovered regarding Bruce’s doings over the previous few days and the nerves I experienced regarding this new treatment, I was grateful—not to sound like a Stage 5 Clinger or whatever, but I really wanted him nearby while I stole some badly-needed time to relax after this godforsaken first treatment.

Unfortunately, relaxation wasn’t exactly what I received. The procedure itself wasn’t horrible, not really—just long, and a little uncomfortable, given that they had just inserted the PICC line into my chest and I wasn’t overly accustomed to having things stuck in there. I sat, as the drugs were first administered via the PICC and a catheter through my arm, and subtly watched Bruce.

Cracks had finally begun to spring across that veneer of his, the mirror-like surface that he held up and reflected only your own perceptions back to you. I could see his worry and concern in the lines that creased his forehead. The set of his shoulders was tense and strained beneath the plain navy tee he wore. More gray hairs along his temples than I had noticed previously lit up beneath the overhead lights. I felt pulled to reach out to him, but, knowing he had never been comfortable with any sort of touch, I resisted the urge, and instead, forced him into watching Youtube videos with me via my smartphone. 

After he sat through an installment of _Regular Ordinary Swedish Mealtime,_ he stared at me.

“What in the hell did I just watch…?” he asked, shaking his head. 

I, meanwhile, had come undone laughing, and ignored him. “You think Alfred ever gets this way when he’s cooking?”

“Smashing onions on cutting boards and talking to a stuffed fox?”

“Sure.”

Bruce shook his head, totally deadpan. “No.”

“Oh, come on.”

“He’s _English,”_ said Bruce, “not Swedish. He’ll _cleave_ to his proper demeanor.”

I laughed at his pun. Bruce didn’t joke much. But when he did, he could form endless puns and plays on words like they were going out of style. On one occasion, he and I crafted at least twenty different plays on the word “mustard.” No joke. 

When the infusion, which was broken up by a nurse who came in to give me some different medications (including the gene therapy tablet, a couple of pills to keep me from ralphing, diphenhydramine for I don’t know what, and so on) in alternating intervals, ended, I was allowed about fifteen minutes to rest, and then Dr. Stone, accompanied by an entourage of researchers, entered the room.

“Well, Dick, how are you feeling?” he asked, giving me a toothy smile.

“Um… Foggy,” I said honestly. 

“Any tingling in your limbs?”

I shook my head.

“Good,” said Stone. “Any chest pain?”

“Outside of the catheter, no.”

Stone nodded. “Dizziness?”

“Not so far. Again, just kind of foggy and tired-feeling.”

“Shortness of breath?”

I shook my head.

“Heart pounding?” Stone marked something in his tablet.

“No, nothing like that,” I said.

“Stomach upset yet?”

“Not yet, no.”

“Itching?”

“No.”

After this Q and A session, Stone, again, went over the list of side effects that I could expect, then sent me over to Dr. Cross, who wrote out and explained to me the boatload of prescriptions that I needed to have filled, and, finally, I was sent on my way. Bruce dropped the orders off at the pharmacy, and we (freaking finally) made it home. Upon our arrival, Alfred sat me down in the den, placed a glass of electrolyte water next to me, and then headed out to pick up the prescriptions. Bruce sat down on the couch opposite me, and worked on his tablet for a while, as I faded in and out of some crime documentaries until the hockey play-offs started. 

Mid-way through the game, I experienced the creeping sensation of something crawling through my stomach, thousands of little fingers scrambling my innards around, and then squeezing everything together, and pressing upwards. My mouth watered. I pressed my fingers into my forehead, and closed my eyes. 

“You okay?” asked Bruce.

“…I don’t feel so good,” I said. The act of speaking blew the top off of the active volcano that had taken over my abdominals, and I leapt to my feet. “I really don’t feel so good…”

I didn’t make it to the nearest half-bath in the corridor that led to the den. I didn’t even make it halfway there. I stumbled in the middle of the hall, and threw up into my shirt. My arms and legs went numb and my head swam as Bruce appeared at my elbow. He helped me to my feet, and helped me the rest of the way to the bathroom. I somehow kept the first round cupped in my shirt, and continued throwing up as Bruce disappeared back into the hallway. 

He reentered the half-bath, and held open a plastic bag. I carefully hulled my ruined (favorite) shirt away, and dropped it with regret into the bag. I think we spoke a little, but I don’t remember much of what was said. I ended up vomiting so hard that the toilet water kicked up to splash me in the face—which, naturally, made me throw up more. 

It was when I, still shaking, my stomach still rolling, my head still pounding, lay down on the couch after this first bout of getting sick that I realized that this whole enterprise was really, _really_ going to suck.

And—trust me—it did. I, granted, had good days and bad days, some better and some worse than others. Consistently, though, I could hardly brush my teeth without spitting blood mixed with toothpaste into the sink. My mouth, ears and nose hurt from the multitude of sores that showed up in them like some lively outbreak of herpes. My hands and feet itched to the point that I sometimes very seriously entertained the idea of just chopping them off and hurling them in a fit of itching-induced rage against the wall. I wondered at times if I’d _ever_ go to the bathroom again, other than to just kneel there with my head eternally stuck in the toilet. I was so exhausted all the time that I couldn’t even concentrate long enough to balance my checkbook. Bruce called my advisor at school to bring her up to date, because the email I tried to construct made it sound as though I was drunk off my ass at the time of composing it. 

Credit where it’s due, though—I managed my work with the Team well enough in this time, in spite of everything, and nobody even seemed to notice that anything was awry, which was exactly how I wanted it to be. I didn’t want anyone treating me differently, giving me special treatment, or so on, and I equally didn’t want Darkseid or Savage to get wind of this. Given what had been done to Garth—with success—they’d have a dang field day with this one. Bruce stayed close by on the job to be sure that I wasn’t pushed beyond my limits and that the time spent at headquarters didn’t step on the time I spent in treatment. Thankfully, when I was particularly out of it, he volunteered me for the dreaded bitchwork that none of us has ever been overly quick to take on by choice… aka paperwork. Trust me. You can’t do the stuff we do without accumulating a freaking Mt. Whitney of paperwork. 

Steenburgen asked me, part of the way through one of the treatment sessions, if I planned on going to a support group. I had shaken my head, and when she asked why, I didn’t really know how to answer her. It just seemed so… _final,_ I guess. 

I told her, truthfully, that I was dealing with the cancer thing fairly well on my own, since the symptoms, although they blew, at least were manageable—so far. So, I bowed out of attending any support groups, and kept at what I was doing.

It was pretty easy, after several weeks of this, to feel that things had kind of evened out, and that I at least wouldn’t get any worse until I actually kicked the bucket, but this feeling of security swiftly went the way of the dodo when I woke up one morning with a skull-cracking headache and a sharp, grasping pain in my chest as I fought in vain to catch my breath. I bent, gasping, over my knees in bed and dug my fingers into the comforter. No matter how I tried to get the pain under control and to just take a breath, I simply couldn’t. I fell out of bed, swam through the spots in my vision to stumble downstairs, and scared the hell out of Bruce and Alfred as I tried through my panting to explain what was wrong. Bruce, having gone to every treatment session and having faithfully paid attention to every obnoxious interview that followed, knew immediately what was going on, and, thankfully, was prepared. As Alfred helped me keep my arms over my head and supported my weight, Bruce produced an oxygen tank and a breathing tube (cannula is the proper term, I think—all I could think of was a bottle of vegetable oil for some dumb reason) that I didn’t even know we had, set the whole thing up, calmly looped the tube over my ears and pressed the prongs into my nostrils. The relief of taking in breaths and feeling like I was _finally_ getting air was permeating, and I slumped against Alfred, inhaling and exhaling until the pain in my head and chest began to abate. 

“Dyspnea,” said Bruce. “You okay?”

I nodded, closing my eyes against the crazily spinning room. Even with my eyes closed, I had the sensation of being lifted up in a giant egg beater that hefted me dizzyingly through the air, swirling me in sickening circles. I was nauseated and saturatingly weak. I made a frustrated noise when I found I was unable to stand on my own. Alfred helped me up, and when he attempted to further help me walk, I pushed him violently away—I did _not_ want help just to walk—and used the bannister to support my weight up the stairs. In the hallway, I braced myself against the wall as I made my way to my room. I felt really bad about how I treated Alfred and ignored Bruce, but after attempting a few stumbling steps back down the hallway to go apologize, I gave it up as a dead end and practically crawled the rest of the way back to my room, dragging the oxygen pack behind me like a busted limb. 

Bruce covered for me and told the Team that I was on a private mission for him, then somehow convinced Stone, Steenburgen and Cross to bring the treatment to the manor, minus the entourage, so I could at least rest at home. Heck if I know how he accomplished that one—but, then again, he also verbally abused the health insurance representative until not only did the company agree to cover the treatment, they agreed to an even higher percentage of coverage, so I suppose I shouldn’t have regarded it as mind-bogglingly supernatural that he managed to talk them around. Bruce _is_ a salesman.

I lay resentfully in bed all of that day after the onslaught of doctors at last vacated. I was too sick and tired to be bored, but too pissed off to really sleep. Being trapped in bed _sucked_. Darkseid’s forces were on the move—all intel gathered indicated that they were actively preparing to invade, whether they had their brainwashed army of superbeings or not. There was work to be done— _big_ work—and I was just _stuck_ there. I couldn’t even lift my arm without feeling as though I’d been socked in the chest. Just to make it to the bathroom, a minuscular walk across my bedroom, was a long, drawn-out struggle that flirted with making some humiliating messes. But, frankly, I did _not_ want help with stupid things like going to the damn bathroom just to pee and throw up any more than I’d wanted help walking. So, I turned down fluids and food for the rest of the day, determined to minimize my trips to the toilet. Alfred tried his best to encourage me to at least force something down, and Bruce got flat-out stern and towered over me like a paternal Goliath brandishing a fork, but I mulishly clenched my teeth and refused. Eventually, they gave up, and after making sure that I at least took the evening round of prescription drugs, they left me to sulk for the evening and watch _Bloodsport_ three times in a row. 

I knew very well the greater, underlying reason for my bad mood, and I’m sure Bruce and Alfred did, too. The following day would mark the anniversary of Wally’s disappearance. It would be difficult, facing his memorial, but anything was better than stewing on it alone, so I had already resolved to go. I fiddled with my mom’s St. Christopher medal as I felt a burning in my throat. A full year, and there were just as many tears inside of me as when he first died. 

That same night, I had, without a word, retreated to the showers in the Watchtower instead of attending the debriefing, where I, like a standard tough guy, just cried by myself, leaning against the tiles of the wall, then lying curled on my side, until the hot water was long gone and I shivered under the cold jets. Kaldur had entered the locker room seeking me out to ask why I was missing the debriefing when I needed to be there to give a report, but, when he discovered me as I was pulling my shirt over my head, the tears still sort of leaking involuntarily down my face, he respectfully backed out and said he’d be sure I was excused later on. Days later was when I dabbled in civilian life for a while. As such, I knew I couldn’t be unavailable the following day.

Determined to get it together, I fell asleep that night, and was visited by an old nightmare. I dreamed that I was nine years old again, waking up to sense an evil presence in my pitch-dark room. In the dream, no matter what lamps or light switches I tried, the bulbs were all burned out and provided no light, even as my panic mounted and, crying with terror in the dark, I screamed for my dad. 

I woke myself up screaming as the first light of dawn came through the window. I reached over and frantically switched the light on, relieved when it came on without a fuss and bathed the room in warm, blessed light. I sat up, panting and regaining my bearings. I brushed my hair out of my eyes, and slowly caught my breath—much easier to do with the oxygen flow tingling its way into my nose. The sheets were soaked. I groaned, and lay back down for a moment.

Sitting back up, I leaned over and checked the tank. It had about an hour left on it. I stretched my weak, aching muscles, and with a feeling of regret, sat on the edge of the bed for a moment while I wrangled with the urge to just flop onto my side and go back to sleep. I reached out to the tank to shut off the oxygen flow, and removed the breathing tube. As I made my way to the bathroom, I discovered that I felt somewhat less awful than the day prior (physically anyway), possibly owing to no longer being in crippling oxygen debt. I dry-heaved a few times, assured myself that in two weeks—when I reached the week of rest from treatment—things would be easier, and got in the shower. When I went to wash my hair, I pulled the first handfuls of it from my scalp.

I stared at the black, wadded clumps in my palms, sad, sodden things, that slipped between my fingers and fell to the floor of the tub.

It was shaping up to be a pretty bad day so far. 

Thankfully, I have a shitload of hair—probably enough on my head to constitute wigs for twenty other people, _Stephen_ included—and even losing these handfuls didn’t leave any readily apparent bald spots, so, I toweled it with care and got dressed in a suit (now too big) for Wally’s memorial. I scrutinized my face while I brushed my teeth. My eyebrows were still there, as were my eyelashes. Much like the hair on my head, I also have plenty of those to go around. I heaved a sigh, and decided not to shave. I’d enjoy my stubble for as long as I could. 

I had to go in for treatment in about an hour—I’d have to duck the eff out of that horrible office if I wanted to make it to the memorial on time. My chest felt tight and I had trouble breathing by the time I was done getting ready, so I nabbed the oxygen pack and looped on the tube before I headed downstairs. 

Once there, I was a little surprised to see Stone & Co. already present in the parlor. I paused.

“So you can make it to the memorial on time,” Bruce explained when I gave him a querying look. 

I groaned. “Okay. Let’s get it over with, then.” 

I took off the button-down shirt and tie, and sat in my undershirt on the loveseat as Steenburgen, intimidatingly decked out in her mask, gloves, and protective gown, hooked the IV for the chemotherapy medications into the PICC line, then inserted the catheter into my arm to administer Stone’s drugs. 

“You know,” I observed, “if you have to wear that monkey suit to protect yourself from this stuff, I _can’t_ imagine it would be good for the furniture.”

Steenburgen chuckled, then completed her task.

“So—a memorial service?” she asked, straightening.

I nodded wordlessly. 

“Your birth parents’?”

I shook my head. “My best friend’s. He died a year ago.”

She gave me a sympathetic look. “I’m sorry.”

I was quiet a moment, then nodded. “Me, too.”

She clasped my shoulder for a brief moment, which made me smile up at her a bit, then she exited the parlor to meet with Stone in the foyer. I looked over at Bruce once I felt confident that they were well enough out of earshot.

“What are you going to do, Bruce?” I asked, noticing that he wasn’t exactly dressed for a memorial.

“I’ve offered to keep an eye on things,” he said. 

“Guard duty?”

“You could say that, I guess,” he said. He frowned, looking me over from where he sat. “You’ve lost weight.”

I gave him an astounded look. “No… Call Richard Simmons.”

He remained unperturbed. “People are going to start asking questions.”

“Well, tell them I’m depressed,” I snapped. 

He continued to peer steadily at me. I didn’t look in his direction. “This won’t work forever, Dick,” he said.

His tone was unusually warm, and I looked up finally to meet his gaze. “I know,” I said heavily. “I’m just not ready for it yet.”

“Ready for what?” he asked. 

I didn’t say anything for a minute as I looked out the window, watching the sun lance golden through the trees in the garden and bathe the forest that framed the manor’s property in an auburn glow. 

“…It makes it real,” I admitted. 

Bruce eyed me, apparently serene, but I saw his jaw working. “Dick. This has been all too real since the first second you left Apokalips.”

I said nothing. I wasn’t as worried about my teammates treating me differently anymore, and I was beginning to feel my resolve wavering somewhat. There was an odd sensation of something accumulating somewhere inside. I knew it wouldn’t be long before whatever was building began to seep out from within. 

So, the idea of at last reaching out to my friends sounded tempting in its own way. Hell, resisting telling just Babs had been a trial up to this point. But, I’d grown a little comfortable with the idea of just sort of… existing, in the way that I had been for the past several weeks, and I had, in fact, grown so comfortable that I quit studying in any detail the dimly lit expanse that was my indeterminate future. 

If I told the others, it was my fear that that dimly lit expanse would go completely black.

“Dick, can I ask you something?” said Bruce, cutting into my thoughts.

I nodded, still not looking in his direction. 

“If Wally were still here,” he said, “would you be so reticent with your situation?”

I sat, disconnectedly aware that I felt cold. A distant spot in my brain reminded me that I needed to check the oxygen tank soon. 

I shook my head, finally. “No,” I said. 

“You would have told him?”

“Yeah. Same day.”

“Why is it different now?”

I didn’t answer him. The truth was that Wally was, and had been since I took my first steps into this particular life, my first, and as such, absolute safest “safe person.” It felt unforgivable to tell Bruce this. So, I didn’t. 

I was glad he wasn’t a big talker, because he didn’t push me.

At the League/Team only memorial service in the Hall of Justice, I sat beside Artemis, Wally’s parents (permitted access for the event), Barry, Iris and Bart. I felt a little over-honored and out-of-place, initially. Artemis, although she seemed relaxed enough as she accepted embraces and handshakes from teammates and Leaguers, grabbed me in a stranglingly tight hug once I entered. 

“Ugh, I’ve been such a wreck,” she murmured so that only I could hear her. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

I rubbed her back. “Not going anywhere.”

Although she didn’t cry, I felt her trembling. I knew, same as me, she had just as many tears in her now. For as much as I wished to just find the first available sympathetic face and pour my heart out to it, I knew that Artemis needed me to be that sympathetic face for her. So, I steeled myself, and when it came time to sit, I let her grab my arm and yank me down beside her, where she gripped my hand with white knuckles. Mrs. West, on the opposite side of Artemis, reached over and patted my knee, laying any of my worries about not belonging there to rest. I squeezed her fingers briefly with my free hand. Babs sat behind me, and when the service began, I felt her hand close over my shoulder. I gratefully leaned my face against her knuckles, and she gave a little press with her fingers. I could smell the hand lotion she used, sweet, flowery and familiar. My heart felt tugged as the ghosts of a thousand memories whispered in my ear. 

The memorial itself felt significantly different than any I’d attended up to that point. There’s no real therapeutic quality in memorials or funerals themselves, at least, not in my mind. I’ve found the gatherings that follow them to usually be more genuine and, as such, more cathartic. Even so, every word that Barry said as he officiated seemed so utterly _real_ as to take pieces off of my heart, like a moon crumbling into bits in a flurry of asteroids. Artemis’ hand gripped mine tighter and tighter, until she finally broke down, tears spilling onto the fabric of her black dress. I reached over, and pulled her close to me, keeping as steady as I could. With her head on my shoulder, her face was perilously close to the PICC line in my chest, which I knew she’d be able to feel through my shirt if she positioned herself correctly. If she felt it, and she asked, I didn’t want to tell her what it was, and make her feel as though she had to turn her attention away from Wally. Whatever Bruce had to say about it, that was not the right day to spill the beans. I gritted my teeth and hoped against hope that she wouldn’t move her head the requisite inch.

The ever-dreaded slideshow of photographs began, each picture of Wally’s goofy smile a wrench. Rose, who is a preternaturally, multi-talented musician, sang, as our newer Team recruit Eddie played piano to accompany her, even though neither of them ever met Wally. They did a beautiful job, regardless of whether they had known him or not. Rose, at least, knew very well what he had meant to me. 

Meant. Past-tense. 

When the memorial itself finally finished, I waited respectfully for Wally’s family to file out, and then made my way toward the doors that led out of the room. To the right of the frame, a bulletin board stood like some kind of menacing, square-shaped Storm Trooper. “Share a Memory,” read the sign atop it, the lettering falsely cheerful. I paused by it, and studied the collage of little Post-It notes already tacked across the white surface.

_“That big mouth. Best ever, Wall-Man.”_

_“Be back in a flash…”_

_“Snickerdoodles… and two birthday cakes. Every year on your birthday, I promise to keep making two cakes and splitting the cupcake with everyone else.”_

I recognized that last—M’gann—and decided I’d had enough. I’d been without the oxygen tank for the entirety of the morning at this point, and was really starting to feel it. I needed to get home, ralph a few times, and force-breathe oxygen from the tank until the room stopped spinning. 

I ducked a couple of people the best that I could in my increasingly desperate attempt to leave, but when Babs gently caught my arm from where she sat, I stopped on a dime. 

“Hey,” she said, smiling up at me. 

“Hi,” I told her, with a fleeting sensation of discomfort. 

Her sky blue eyes, the ones I could lose hours in (and was in the process of doing right about then), gave me a probing look. “How are you doing?”

I gave her a wan smile. “How am I doing, or how am I _doing_?”

“Whichever you feel like sharing.”

I paused, and decided on honesty. I lifted a shoulder. “…Terrible.”

She took my hand in hers, and I stood, feeling awkward. One year ago, as I, still crying, left the locker room in the Watchtower to head blindly to the Zeta Tubes, Babs called my name, and before I could turn all the way around, she had wrapped her arms around me, tight as a straitjacket. She walked with me to the Tubes, then home to my apartment, then upstairs, inside. Twelve hours later, we’d put a title on it. Standing there, it felt like we’d never even broken up. 

“You want to come talk?” she said, keeping her voice low and inclining her head in the direction of the library. 

I looked, and saw through the glass doors that no one was milling around in there. I wanted to take her up on her offer, but I just couldn’t—if I did, _everything_ would come out. 

“I’m okay, Babs,” I said, squeezing her hand. 

She eyed me, then ran her gaze up and down. She tilted her head. “ _Are_ you?”

I nodded. “Yeah. Thanks, though.”

“Dick,” she said, and then shook her head. “Are you _sure_ you’re okay? I mean… you’ve lost a lot of weight. Like… a _lot._ Of weight.” She reached over and tugged at the bottom of my shirt. “How are your pants even staying up?”

I shrugged. “Belt?”

“Come on.” She paused, then took a breath. “Look. You can still talk to me, okay? I mean, you’re my best friend, _nothing_ will change that.”

“I’ll be okay, Babs,” I said, shifting my weight. “…Just got over some flu or another and haven’t really gotten my appetite back yet. It’ll get there. Just not completely recuperated.”

She arched a brow. “You do _not_ lose this much weight from the flu.” 

“Well, maybe it’s a tapeworm.” 

She frowned, unamused. “You’re not doing anything stupid, are you?”

“What do you mean?”

“Um…” She lowered her voice. “Starving, puking, whatever?”

Babs was all too familiar with bulimia, given that her mother had dealt with it for years. I frowned, realizing that the weight loss and secretive behavior I’d displayed around her in recent weeks had to appear to be the result of something related, and bearing in mind Wally’s anniversary and the fact that I was still jilted, it was a pretty reasonable deduction. Babs was hyper-sensitive to signs of disordered eating in others as it was. 

I shook my head. “No, nothing like that,” I assured her, feeling her fingers lace between mine.

She looked unconvinced, but nodded. “If you say so… Look. Like I said, I’m _always_ here, if you need me. Okay?”

I was growing short of breath, and not just from this dyspnea crap. That she was there, I knew, was all I would get, but, unfairly, I wanted more. Very much as I wanted to remove my hand from hers, but couldn’t.

“So how’s Foxy?” I asked.

She laughed. “Fat. But she’s good. …You should come by sometime and see her.”

I nodded, and agreed. There was a long silence. 

Then, the words, “I miss you,” all stupid, pathetic, and quiet, seemed to just fall out of my mouth.

Babs took my other hand, and passed her thumbs over my knuckles. “I miss you, too.”

I was in imminent danger by then of pouring my heart out about every single thing, from how I found the facts that she loved tea and hated coffee, that she could hold full-blown text conversations in binary, that she had an impressive collection of nail polish, that her favorite show was old school _Miami Vice,_ that she occasionally butted heads with her mom but was a total daddy’s girl, that she sometimes snorted when she laughed to be the most adorable things imaginable, and that I would have done anything she asked if it just meant that she’d break it off with _Stephen_ and let me try again. I withdrew my hands from hers.

“Umm…”

“Sorry,” she said, flushing a little. 

I shook my head, and passed a hand over my face. “Ahhhh… It’s okay.” I smiled.

“Call me if you need anything—seriously,” she said. “You’ve been a total deadbeat friend lately. So I mean it—call. Okay? I’ve gone too long without my best friend.”

I nodded, turned, and Zeta’ed to the Bat Cave. I headed through the manor to my room, chucked the oversized button-down and slacks, dry-heaved until my throat hurt, and then applied the blessed oxygen. Even though it wasn’t even three in the afternoon, I collapsed facefirst atop my bed and passed out for the rest of the day, not waking until Bruce shook my shoulder. I didn’t want to get up, but I knew he wouldn’t hear a word of refusal regarding food, and I was aware that I was due to take that evening’s pharmacy stock of pills, anyway, so I, trembly and exhausted, followed him downstairs, took the meds, and managed some rice and chicken, which, like everything else, tasted minerally and inedible. Chemo blows. 

Bruce asked after Wally’s memorial. I had been so out of it that the events of that morning hadn’t caught up with me yet. Just the mention of the service, and I felt like Darkseid back-handed me, then copped a squat on my chest (been there, done that—it felt about the same.) Staring at the congealing mound of food that remained on my plate, I shook my head and said I was too tired to talk about it, then retreated upstairs. 

The following morning marked the return to the routine of getting dragged out of bed to the doctor’s office for treatment, after which I, per the norm, was harassed by Stone as he interrogated me on every little thing, from whether or not the laxatives I was prescribed worked, to the efficacy of the antiemetic, and to whether or not I could function in the sack. Even Bruce lifted his eyebrows and looked up from his tablet at this. I answered honestly that I didn’t know. When Babs and I broke up, as covered previously I had zero interest in other women, and frankly, it wasn’t like I’d been in the mood to self-complete since I got sick.

That question irked me a lot. And honestly, I was getting absolutely sick and tired of the whole thing. I know—I’m Nightwing. I ought to have had an ironclad will to survive, and fight, and last as long as I could, even if just to give the cancer a big middle finger on my way out. “Thought you’d take me out in six months? Well, fuck you, I put in twice that, bitch!” I, who had the balls to leap headlong into battle with Darkseid, could _surely_ have done the same with The Dark Lord Cancer. 

The truth was, I could feel the fight starting to slide out of me, slowly delivered in an afterbirth of dignity. I told myself to hang in there until the week of rest. Things would get marginally better, at least for a time, after that. 

Well, I didn’t make it to the week of rest. As it is with life, and particularly with life having cancer, Shit Happened. 

I was up in the Watchtower when said Shit hit the fan. A few days remained until rest from treatment. I had woken up that morning so sick that I damn near shit the bed, but somehow crawled to the bathroom before I completely lost control. I wound up sitting on the toilet, and vomiting into a trashcan between my knees. Alfred had caught me in my bathroom when Bruce sent him to figure out what was taking me so long to come downstairs. Alfred told me that he figured Cross had mistaken the dosage needed when he prescribed me the lactulose I had taken the night before, and we assumed that was the long and short of the problem. He helped me get dressed, and fed me plain toast and bananas (tasteless and mealy. Gross.)

I felt like I was irrefutably going to die, then and there, during treatment. I felt _so sick._ I can’t even really tell you what it felt like, looking back—my stomach _hurt_ with an unparalleled persistence and, frankly, I was just _sick._ I tried to block out the overload of sensations, breathe, and get through it the best that I could. The nurse administering the drugs noted that I had a fever, and said that, given the fact that my screenings indicated some seriously heightened immunosuppression possibly bordering on neutropenia, I should probably go all-in on some rest and be closely monitored following the appointment, and both Cross and Steenburgen kept fastidiously posted. Bruce insisted I skip Stone's post-treatment cross-examination, and he and I made it back to the manor, where I tried to nap in the den with him close by, but we both—it _figured—_ ended up paged to the Watchtower. Bruce, having already made a thousand excuses for me that week, told me that if I could just muscle through that afternoon, he’d figure out a way to get me out of it. 

I stood miserably in the mission control room as he went over the task at hand, which was to turn up proof that Lex Luthor had a personal tie to Darkseid that went beyond his apparent connections with the Light. Intel had suggested that clues might lie within the Lex-Corp building in Metropolis, buried somewhere in the form of both hard-copy and digital files—easily destroyed if in danger of being discovered—deep within its confines. To achieve the ends we sought, we had to bend the rules a little—but what they didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them. I had set the hack in place months before to ensure that the squads could enter the premises and move about freely with complete access to the building’s systems. I figured I’d be sent out as field leader, given that it was my hack, and I was right—Kaldur enlisted me to lead Alpha. 

My stomach painfully twisted and churned, clamping down so hard upon itself that just to stay upright on my feet was becoming increasingly superhuman to accomplish. Whether I would get sick was not a matter of if—it was quickly becoming a matter of when, and that when became any second. Worse yet, I had a feeling it would be a repeat of that morning. I was even starting to wonder if I needed to go to the hospital when Bruce asked if I was okay. Not wanting to disrupt the mission, I brushed him off the best I could. How the hell I was going to manage a covert operation inside Lex-Corp’s building, I had absolutely no idea. 

Well, at the least, I supposed it would have some nice facilities—I’d be in some posh surroundings with shell-shaped handsoap and moist, heated towelettes when I had to duck away to get sick. At least there was that.

Babs unwittingly rescued me when she asked if I could explain how to work with the hacks that I had in place to Gamma Squad. I doubted my own ability to convey this information with any sense of coherence to the newer team members, but at least it delayed the impending disaster that was the field, that I was sure even Batman couldn’t get me out of. 

I valiantly fought through my symptoms to explain the hacks to Gamma Squad, only to heave mid-sentence. I paused, collecting myself, and waved off Rose when she approached me with concern. My ears rang and my vision blurred until everything I looked at resembled an up-close Impressionist painting. When I tried again to speak, I barely made it a few words in before my gut erupted with an unprecedented violence. 

I clapped a hand over my mouth, which was filling rapidly as my belly insistently discharged its contents. I vainly attempted to find something, _anything,_ that I could vomit into—I wasn’t going to make it to the bathroom at this rate. 

Bruce Showed Up at my side right about then, calmly steadying my stumbling gate and evenly guiding me to a trashcan. I felt the ground jar my knees as I went down and hurled into the bin with such force that my entire body was thrown forward. I caught my breath between heaves, shuddering like an engine backfiring. 

Something _really_ wasn't right. I’ve been injured, and badly, in the past, but I had never truly been frightened—at least, not like I was in this moment. Instinctively, I knew I was in _big_ freaking trouble. But I couldn’t breathe more than a few words at a time, and worse yet, the squad hovered around like a chorus in a Greek tragedy, meaning I couldn’t express that I probably needed a hospital to Bruce. 

He eventually sent the others off, but not before my body was one giant, unendurable system of _painandsick._ I hovered over the bin, my arms wobbling, my lungs aching as I weakly forced (not enough) air into them. I became aware of Bruce’s hand, warm and strong, on my back, between my shoulderblades. I could sense the warmth and safety that he emanated—that he always emanated—and in that moment, I wanted so badly to revert to childhood and just plunge headlong into that warmth and safety, burying the blinding agony and freezing chills and roiling sickness in it. But just that amount of movement was too much. Instead, I collapsed on my back, closing myself off into a little round ball somewhere deep inside, a place of silence and stillness and not-feeling, where I was safe from the pain and fear. When the first murmurs of darkness beckoned to me, I discovered that it wasn’t scary at all—it was, in truth, very, very inviting. At its gentle solicitation, I relinquished every ounce of fight I had left, and just opened up myself up to it with an overwhelming, profound gratitude. The world faded out of view, passing farther and farther away, as though I sank into an endless pool of warm, soothing water, and even though I could hear Bruce speaking my name, I had sunk too deep to answer him. 

With a slap to my cheek, he wrested me to the surface for the barest second. For his sake, I tried to stay there, but I just couldn’t seem to hang on, although he gripped my face in his palm and told me not to drop off. 

_I’m sorry, Bruce,_ I wanted to say, but I had no voice _._

If I was going to, I realized, I had to do it now.

So, I let go.

It was easier than falling asleep.

Then, pale yellow light. 

That’s the first thing I remember. 

I blinked against it, my eyelids grimy and weighted. 

The second thing I remember is that my body was not my body. Whatever I woke up in, it felt like a heavy, sodden lump of clay, a golem of sorts, something lifeless that did not belong to me. My breath came involuntarily—pushed in, pulled out, all through my nose, and just barely by any conscious instinct of mine. My mouth was home to a barren, parched, foul desert. I looked down, the movement of my eyes piercing my skull. 

I lay in what apparently was a hospital bed. By the metal handlebars on the sides and the sterile-white, knit blanket, I could deduce that much. My arms, two long, greyish stamens resting heavily atop the ribbed, woolen surface, were jammed with tubes. Some reverberating, rhythmic, rumbling sound echoed in a fluctuating cadence, moving in time with my manufactured breath. Something itched under my nose. I braved a turn of the head and saw that I was hooked up to a BiPAP. A monitor beeped the report of my heart, which stubbornly beat inside my chest. Bags of who-knew-what hung like bulbous seedpods from metal branches over the bed. 

“Ah, so there you are.”

I looked over in the direction of the unfamiliar voice, and saw a young man in navy scrubs appear from where he had hunched down beside the bed. He was apparently busy with something; although what, I wasn’t certain of off the bat. When I squinted against the grit in my eyes to discern what kept him busy, I felt a sickening stab of humiliation when I saw that he was dealing with a bedpan. 

I kept my eyes resolutely trained on the blanket as he continued bustling about, then quickly washed his hands in the sink that hung like an ATM from a random spot in the wall. I decided to take in my surroundings. Further exploration revealed a folding curtain to my left that separated me, presumably, from a roommate, and a window to my right that opened up to an impressive view of Gotham. The nurse approached my bedside, looked at the level in one of the big seedpods—IV bags—and then smiled down at me. I looked up at him, unsure if I could talk—my mouth felt like a mass of stuffing and my breath was so insistently in-out, in-out that I felt I wouldn’t be able to juxtapose a word anywhere over its rhythm. 

“I am David,” the nurse said, his voice accented. I couldn’t place it, quite—Nigerian, maybe. He smiled, a big, warm, pleasant smile that immediately put me more at ease. “It is good to see your eyes open after so much time. How are you feeling, Richard?”

My mouth worked a bit, and I attempted a word. Nothing came out.

“I will tell you what,” said David. “Blink once for you are okay. Blink twice for you are feeling like shit.”

I wheezed a bit of a laugh at this last, and pointedly blinked twice. 

He laughed heartily. “I thought as much. Can you hold up fingers for me?”

I gave my fingers a feeble bit of movement to demonstrate that I could. 

“Scale of one to ten, rate your pain?”

I thought about it for a second. I didn’t necessarily feel like I was in _pain,_ per-se. Rather, I felt just… sick. Weak. Spent. Leaden. I had a feeling I should have been in pain, but I suspected I was on something—I felt detached, somehow, even from the sick-feeling. I wondered if he’d let me rate how exhausted I was on a scale of one to ten instead. 

I shook my head, and winced when the stabbing sensation whipped back through it. Maybe I hurt worse than I thought.

“Cannot tell?” asked David. 

Instead of attempting a nod, I blinked once. 

“Then… either you are a consummate badass… or you are not in need of increased Quadrapax,” he said, grinning.

I mouthed the word “both” at him, and he laughed, the sound infectious and engaging. 

“Well. Are you ready for some ice chips?” he asked, drawing up a seat next to me. 

Again, I blinked. If they dissolved the infestation of cotton candy parasites that had nested in my mouth, I’d eat all the ice chips in the world. 

David produced them seemingly by magic, and when I tried to move to reach for them, I found I couldn’t seem to lift my head. He gently laid a hand on my shoulder. 

“Let me,” he said warmly. “You will be wearing them otherwise.”

 _I can do it,_ I wanted to say, but my voice was on strike, and my arm, although my brain gave it a direct order to move, seemed to have spontaneously gone deaf. I realized with some regret that I wouldn’t be feeding myself for a while. 

“That stone giant that is your dad said you might be one to get a little ahead of yourself,” David said, spooning some ice chips into my parched mouth. The sensation of the cold, quickly melting chips was like a sudden oasis. I sagged with relief into the pillows beneath me and got over the indignity of being fed pretty quickly. David continued. “So, I will share something with you. In my home in Africa, life moves somehow slower. No rush hour. No jockeying for that first place in line. But here, in Gotham, it seems everyone is all tensed up and in a hurry—even lunches are consumed in a rush, and coffee breaks are meant only to fuel up in moments for the next race. There is always a need to be nowhere fast. So, Richard, pretend for a time that you are not in Gotham, and that there is no need for this rush. You take your time, and recover on your own terms, even if those terms are slow by your thinking.”

He placed the ice chips on the stand by the bed, and I eyed them ruefully.

“Now then,” he said, rising. “Since you have finally woken up, it is only a matter of time before Stone shows up. He is a bit of a bulldog, that one. I would advise you to get as much rest as you can, while you can.” 

I wondered, for a second, how long I’d been out. David seemed to notice, and smiled down at me.

“Oh. I forgot, I am sorry. You have been out for seven days. You were brought in with neutropenic enterocolitis, or typhlitis, which, I am happy to say, you are recovering from satisfactorily, without the need for surgery. If you are wondering about your father, he was called into work this morning, but he said he should return by this afternoon. He will be so relieved to see you awake. I swear he has not slept in all this time.”

Warm Fuzzies. I was growing increasingly tired. I fought the urge to close my eyes.

“Also, a very pretty young lady has been in several times asking after you.”

I looked up with interest, and David smiled.

“Several of your friends, as well. I would not be surprised if they are still camped out in the waiting room. They have been very dedicated.” 

Fuzzies, again. My chest warmed. 

“And you will see them soon enough, do not worry, my friend,” said David, beaming his big smile. “Given your steady progress, you should be able to go home very soon.” He laid a hand on my forehead. “Now. Are you comfortable? Blink once for yes.”

I blinked once. 

“Very good. I will let you rest.”

I was out in seconds. 

When I awoke, I saw, with relief, that Bruce was by my bedside. He sat, his head on his hand, his tablet on his lap. He dozed, his jaw heavy on his palm. Judging by the fading light through the window, it was sometime in the evening. I started (and was doubly grateful for the BiPAP, or I’d have lost my breath) and he jerked awake at the sound of rapidly rising voices of two men arguing. A father, I gathered, arguing with the doctor about the latter’s decisions. I lay, the BiPAP dictating my respiration, keeping me calm.

Bruce looked over his shoulder, then, turning, saw that I was awake. 

“Oh, finally. How do you feel?” he asked, leaning toward me.

I wanted to extend a hand to him, seeing how worn out and fearful he looked, but apparently, the wires connecting my arm to my brain had been cut. I still wasn’t sure I could talk, particularly given that now, in addition to the man quarrelling with the doctor, some poor woman down the way began to keen and sob like the ghost of La Llorona, but I gave it a try.

“Just dandy,” I tried to say, and was horrified at how nothing but a zombie-ish “I want to eat your brains” groan came out.

Bruce smiled, one of his rare smiles that really made you see who he might have been, had his life been different. His smile faded when the woman’s screaming grew louder as she joined the fray. 

“You don’t have to talk,” he said quietly. “Just rest.” He grimaced at the sound of more screaming and arguing. 

Bruce looked exhausted. His face was drawn and pinched, his short hair a little unkempt. He wore a plain white tee and jeans, clearly rushed clothing. His eyes were bloodshot and outlined with red.

I wondered, in that moment, if it might have been easier on him had I just died. At least he wouldn’t have had to go through any of this—all of the sleepless days and nights in the ICU that he had clearly spent wondering if this was it, while listening to the mournful cries of the poor, unfortunate souls that grew only poorer and more unfortunate as they lost their loved ones, and knowing that his turn to join them in grief would be coming all too soon. 

But, there I was, alive, and I thought, for a second, that maybe I should go on surviving. And if not for my own sake, at least for Bruce’s. But the truth was that I couldn’t even picture a life beyond this room in the ICU, with the blue-tinted, weak lighting overhead and the varying colors from the city outside mixing to create a surreal, dream-like world, one of this bed, my hithertofore unseen roommate, the BiPAP machine cuing my breathing like some tireless conductor of an orchestra, and my only duty to lie there and be sick. Wayne Manor seemed lightyears away, intraversible and a place I would never see again. It hurt, physically, that I could not so much as lift my arm to reach out to Bruce to provide him the comfort he so obviously needed, and I knew would _never_ actively reach for. I tried to speak, but just couldn’t. I was _so_ damn weak. I had woken scant moments before, and already wanted nothing more than to return to sleep. And honestly, if not for Bruce, I would have been perfectly okay with not waking back up. The expanse of my future, once dimly-lit but visible, had, finally, in my mind’s eye, gone black. 

Too exhausted to even communicate any of this to Bruce, I closed my eyes, and dropped off, secure, at least, in the knowledge that he was there. All those things in time.

Within a few days, I could speak with reasonable intelligence, a few more days, and I could feed myself a little, and still a few more days, and I could sit up with some help. With each small bit of progress, I felt a little readier to go home. The ICU isn’t exactly a cozy convalescent home. As I regained strength, things like techs coming in every hour to take my vitals, and the abrasive sounds of sobbing parents and yammering staff started to wake me up with greater and greater ease. My roommate, when he at last came to, was completely insufferable—he was always moaning for more pain medication, lashing out at the nurses (even going so far as to bite one of them), verbally abusing the glut of doctors that showed up at his bedside to explain his diagnosis, and nightly pestering me, yanking the curtain aside, throwing things at me, stumbling around my bed, and assaulting me with questions about why I was in there with him (and then attempting to one-up my illness, sometimes in gibberish.) After one night of being continually disrupted in my efforts to sleep, as the sunlight beamed in bright and headachy through the window, I finally buzzed David over and begged him the best I could through my weak speech and the intrusive BiPAP to get my strongly disliked roommate to please leave me alone after the third pillow I took to the face. He saw to it, although I don’t know how he quieted him. David then returned to my bedside, and sat with me as I indulged a moment of self-pity. He explained that the poor dude had neuroshistosomiasis—in other words, shistosoma eggs had lodged in his brain and obstructive granulomas had formed there in response. He had contracted the parasite on, of all things, a vacation. Encephalitis, dementia, probable paralysis—the whole thing sucked. _Some vacay_ , I thought, a little sad. David assured me that the curtain partitioning me off from him would be guarded as faithfully as possible from then on to ensure that I could rest. This became unnecessary, as once I brought it up to Bruce, he shamelessly paid off the staff so that he could stay overnight to ensure I’d not be bothered again. One act of standing up, his six-and-a-half-foot bulk looming over the Roommate From Hell, and one sharply issued, “Shut your damn mouth or I’ll shut it for you,” and the dude cowered into bed and bawled for the staff to come and drug him. Bruce stayed at my bedside, the dragon standing watch over the hoard, until the guy was finally transferred elsewhere. Even in his absence, though, there remained the onslaught of vitals checks, shouting, crying parents, pervasive beeping from the countless machines that dressed the ward, loud emergencies, visitors noisily conversing. 

But, at least there was David. I became familiar with plenty of nurses and doctors in that time period, but he was, by far, my favorite. Steenburgen even noted that his uncanny ability to cheer me up seemed to amply speed along my recovery. He and I are still friends to this day. 

When Steenburgen and Cross agreed that I could probably be given the thumbs-up to go home within a day or so, since I was able to shuffle halfway down the hall with the aid of a walker and was breathing reliably with simple oxygen versus requiring the BiPAP, Stone had David get me somewhat dressed (in my mind, a hospital gown and robe do not constitute “dressed”), stick me in a wheelchair (which I hated), and push me into a meeting room so that he could discuss further treatment with me. 

Although I worried about how Bruce would feel, I turned it all down. 

Stone stared at me in stunned silence.

“Why on earth would you decline treatment?” he demanded, visibly flabberghasted.

I had no idea how to answer him. After the typhlitis, I guess I was just about out of gas. Although Stone tried to encourage me to continue with treatment, I couldn’t bring myself to listen to him. I just sat, and stared out the window as I watched the city move by at its hectic pace on the streets below. In the middle of Stone’s preaching, I gestured David over, and asked if he’d wheel me back to bed, even as Stone kept speaking. Ignoring the unending protests, David grasped the handlebars of the chair, and walked me out of the room. He helped me into bed, and, understanding that I was always chilled, covered me with an extra blanket. Interrupted only once to have the PICC line removed, something I insisted on having done ASAP, I slept until the following day, when Bruce came to pick me up, and take me home.

David helped me get dressed in the jeans (way too big) and _Star Trek_ shirt (that I swam in) that Bruce had brought in for me. Then, faced again with the wheelchair, I clenched my jaw and shook my head. 

“Come on, Dick,” said David encouragingly.

I, again, shook my head. 

For whatever reason, I just couldn’t reconcile the need to be wheeled around. I wanted to walk down to the car, and from the car into the manor, even if that walking was half-stepping with a walker like a geriatric Trekkie. 

“Dick,” David said again.

“No,” I insisted. “What’s wrong with the walker?”

“You will exhaust yourself before you are out the door—please trust me on this.”

“Please trust me when I say I don’t need that thing.”

He gave me his kind smile. “Dick, please trust me when I say you do.”

I looked at my lap, and sighed. “…I _hate_ this.”

He nodded, and laid a hand on mine. “I know you do.”

I looked hard at him. “I mean I _really_ hate it.”

“I know.”

“Please don’t make me go in that chair.”

David’s face, although still warm, became stern. “I am sorry, Dick. But you must.”

“ _Please_ don’t.”

“I know it is difficult,” said David, his voice firm. “But please listen to me as your friend. You need the chair.”

I felt like crying. I just wanted to _walk._ But, finally, I caved, and allowed David to help me into the godforsaken thing. 

Bumping along through the hospital in that stupid chair I imagined to be worse than an eternity spent with my neuroshistosomiasis-ridden roommate. I gritted my teeth and tried to think happy thoughts. I had nothing.

Bruce, who had pulled up to the curb outside, got out of the car, and busied himself folding the chair and placing it in the back of the Range Rover. David, who supported my weight as Bruce dealt with the chair, turned and gave me a hug. 

It. Felt. Amazing.

I hugged him back, and when he released me, I felt, again, like crying. It sounds lame, but I wanted—no, _needed—_ a hug, one longer than just five seconds in duration. 

“You take care of yourself now,” said David. “And be sure that the stone giant does the same.”

I nodded, still struggling with the act of not-crying as he helped me into the car and loaded the oxygen pack onto the floor by my feet. He shut the door, and rapped the window twice. I fiddled with the seatbelt, and sank into the seat. 

“Ready?” asked Bruce. 

I nodded, and he pulled the gearshift to head away from the hospital. 

I was quiet for a while as I watched the familiar sights of Gotham pass by outside of the window. I knew it was hot outside, but I wished Bruce would shut off the air conditioning in the car. I was one wrong burst of air from transmorphing into a popsicle. 

“So when are you scheduled to restart treatment?” he asked, glancing over at me. “I imagine they’ll give you a little longer to recover, but I’d at least like to plan for it.”

I didn’t reply at first. I had been dreading this conversation since I buffed Stone. 

“Dick?” he said.

I remained quiet for a moment more, gazing out of the window. 

“I declined any more treatment,” I said finally. I left out the part that I’d also listed myself as DNR. Do Not Resuscitate.

Bruce jerked his head so hard I thought he’d give himself whiplash to stare at me. The car’s momentum guttered and slowed. Behind us, blaring horns sounded. Bruce slammed the button for the hazard lights, and pulled off to the side.

“What?” he snapped. “Why?”

“It’s not worth it,” I told him. I leaned against the door frame and closed my eyes. 

“You _can’t_ ,” he insisted. “If you decline further treatment, it’s barely even a month before—”

“I know.”

“Then why would you do it?” he demanded.

I heaved a sigh, and opened my eyes. “Like I said. It’s not worth it.”

“Why?”

I weakly lifted my shoulders. “Just isn’t.”

Silence. A long, long silence.

“Dick,” he said at last, his voice low, “please. Don’t do this.”

I had a good idea of where the conversation was going, and looked over at him. “Don’t do what?”

I wished I hadn’t looked at him. Although his features were steeled, his eyes were dark and haunted. 

“Don’t give up,” he said.

“I’m not giving up,” I said. 

“Then what do _you_ call it?”

I couldn’t look at him anymore. I turned away, and sighed. 

“I don’t know, acceptance, maybe,” I told him. I resolutely stared out the window, anywhere but at Bruce. 

“The hell’s _that_ supposed to mean, acceptance?” His voice was rising.

The flow of oxygen felt tickly, and made my nostrils itch. I scratched at my nose. “…I’m tired, Bruce,” I murmured.

His voice lowered. “I know you are. Believe me, I do. But Dick, you’ve never been one to back down from a fight,” he said. He trained his eyes on the dash. “…I know it’s been a struggle. I understand how tired you are. But you _have_ to keep fighting. You can’t just lie down and die.”

I looked over at him, and saw that his face, finally, bore a real expression—and that expression bordered on desperation and heartache. Apparently, and whether he realized it or not, I wasn’t the only one who needed to be touched. I reached over to him, laying a hand on his, and gave him as good a smile as I could muster. “That’s not what I’m doing.”

“So what _are_ you doing?” he asked, his voice breaking. The sound had the same effect on my heart. I tightened my grip on his hand. 

“Listen,” I said gently. “For right now, I just want to focus on spending as much quality time with my loved ones as I can.” I paused. “Can you understand that?”

“You’re not going to have any sort of quality existence without treatment,” he insisted. “All in one second, you’ll go downhill, and then in the next, you’ll be gone.”

I nodded, and did not release his hand. “I know. I know I won’t have much time left. But… sitting in that horrible office jammed full of tubes, getting barraged with Dr. Stone’s endless questions when I’m so tired I can’t even comprehend Big Bird, puking in every corner of the mansion, shitting into a colostomy bag, not even being able to shower or make it to the toilet by myself… Bruce. Come on. That’s not how I want to spend the remainder of my days here, even if it means giving me more time.”

“How _are_ you planning on spending this time, then, huh? Dead? You think your pals are going to party with your ghost? And really—you think you’re _not_ going to be doing any of the things you just mentioned if you turn down any more treatment? You’ll only be doing all of the above, just so stoned on morphine you won’t even recognize your own pants. _God._ Don’t be stupid.”

His angry words threatened to shatter my skull like an eggshell. I finally let go of his hand, and stared ahead, out of the windshield. I sighed, my fatigue penetrating. I couldn’t argue anymore, or try to make him understand. I was just too damn tired. Plus, if I'm being honest here, I was afraid I might start crying if he kept yelling at me.

“Bruce,” I said, rubbing at my aching forehead. “Please just stop.”

In that moment, he startled me when he turned in his seat and loomed over me. His eyes flashed in his twisted face. His wide, enormous shoulders blocked the light from the sun. If I had just had the energy, I might have cowered.

“I couldn’t do anything about my parents,” he screamed, his voice gratingly loud and hurting my head and ears. “I couldn’t do anything about yours. I couldn’t do anything about Jason. But I _can_ do something about you. I _can_. I can help you. But you _have_ to meet me halfway here. Because if you don’t—” He broke off, then slammed the heel of his hand into the steering wheel. The sound made me jump. “God _dammit_ , Dick. I bore my parents. I bore Jason. But I _can’t_ bear you.” 

He shook, visibly, and audibly. I stared at him in shock. I had _never_ seen him like this, not even after Jason was killed. 

He went on. “I know you talked some garbage about how I saved you, all those years ago. You said as much. Didn’t you?” I just nodded in silence. “Okay. That’s all well and good. Fine. Think what you want. But… Since that night in the alley… I couldn’t find _anything_ that brought my life any meaning. To hell with the Batman, to hell with saving the world one misguided hoodlum or criminal mastermind at a time, to hell with charity donations, to hell with benefits, to hell with funding morally defensible enterprises—none of that meant a damn thing to me in the end. The only thing that has _ever_ brought my life—and all of the above—any meaning since I watched my parents gunned down behind that theater was petitioning the state to adopt you… and being granted that privilege.” 

I stared at him, still not speaking. 

His voice lowered. “ _You_ saved _me,_ Dick. Watching you, and seeing how you’ve weathered all of the storms in your life, I really think you’d have been fine, whether I’d taken you in or not. But… _I_ wouldn’t have been. _I_ needed you. I _need_ you _now._ You have to realize that. All that I am now… it’s all because—”

He, again, punched the steering wheel, and then dropped his forehead to his clenched fists, gripping the steering wheel so crushingly tight that I could hear the leather strain.

I had had _no_ idea that this was how he felt. 

“Bruce.”

He threw the car into gear and whipped out into traffic. His jaw was set as he drove, staring forward through the windshield, his jaw working and his breath agitated. 

“Bruce,” I tried again.

“Just don’t,” he growled, the engine matching his voice as he floored the accelerator. I gave up, sighed, and leaned against the door frame, watching the same old landmarks roll by as we sped home. 

He stalled the car in the driveway and didn’t even look at me as he threw the door open and stalked into the manor, just leaving me there in the car. With a sigh, I pulled on the handle, cursing a little when my weak fingers slipped on it. Thankfully, Alfred appeared, and helped me with the door. 

“Well, what on earth has gotten Master Bruce all hot in the biscuit?” he asked, frowning disapprovingly over his shoulder. 

“Um… I did, Alfred,” I said, trying not to lean on him too much as he helped me out of the car. He redirected my weight to the doorframe as he went to get the chair out of the back.

“Surely it was not worth such a tirade as to storm inside and just leave you out here by yourself,” he said.

“I’m not by myself. You’re here, aren’t you?” 

He smiled at me. “Yes, sir, I certainly am. Now then. Let’s head inside. It is good to have you home.”

“Oh, believe me, it’s good to be home.”

“Well, we have greatly anticipated your return, sir. But explain. Why has Master Bruce suddenly channeled his ten-year-old self?”

I mulled over how to let the cat out of the bag to Alfred. It occurred to me that this was going to be a difficult cat to deal with, no matter who I was talking to. 

“…I told him I declined further treatment,” I explained, then, with a sigh, ran a hand over my thinning hair. 

Alfred paused in the act of unfolding the chair. He gazed at me for a moment, emotions flitting like little fish across the deep pools of his eyes. He looked down, and completed his task. 

“It has been a trial, hasn’t it, Master Richard,” he said, more a statement than an inquiry.

I didn’t say anything, just leaned in silence against the car. 

“If I may, sir,” said Alfred.

I nodded, expecting a rehash of Bruce’s “Don’t give up” speech.

He helped me into the chair.

“For these last several months,” he said, “I have watched you endure. Master Bruce has watched you endure. Even those things most unendurable, you have firmly stood your ground, and _endured._ You have fought hard. But, Master Richard, possibly, the time has come to _rest_.”

I let these words sink in as he wheeled me inside. I was _so_ ready to rest.

Once in the foyer, I looked past the entryway and into the parlor, where Bruce sat on the sofa, his hands balled into fists atop his knees, his head leaning back against the cushions. I gazed at him for a moment as I answered a couple of Alfred’s questions about dinner and hospice. Then, my mind made up, I shakily pulled myself out of the chair.

“Sir?” said Alfred.

I inclined my head toward where Bruce sat, and Alfred nodded. 

“Do you need help?” he asked.

I shook my head. Something had hit me, and hard. With the sole exception of Alfred, no one had supported Bruce in this time—at least, not really. Certainly not in the way that he needed, and certainly not just him, by himself, without me in the foreground. It was grossly unfair, I realized. And it had to change. The tirade in the car only clinched it.

I slowly, torturously, made my shuffling way across the foyer, leaning my weight against the wall, the oxygen pack slung by its strap over my shoulder. One step at a time. _Step._ Breathe. _Step._ Breathe. 

I approached the sofa. Bruce’s eyes were closed. Spent, I lowered the oxygen to the floor, and then sank into the cushions beside where he sat. Without waiting for him to acknowledge that I was there, I leaned against him, my head on his shoulder.

He stiffened, and drew slightly away. I shifted my weight to lean in closer. His body was like a rigid, unmoving block.

“Sorry. I’m just… not real big on hugs,” he said, his discomfiture painfully tangible.

“ _I_ am,” I told him. “And I need one. Get over it.”

“…Might not be a good one.”

“I don’t give a shit.”

A second clicked by. Another.

And then, finally, he lifted his arms—those big, strong, my-dad-can-beat-up-your-dad arms—and slowly wrapped them around me, like two powerful, protective tree limbs, and I slumped readily into that embrace. I pulled myself closer. I felt him rest his head atop mine. The heat he emanated warmed me through, and for the first time in months, I felt truly _safe._

I chucked all pretense, buried my face in his broad, warm chest, and just sobbed like a big, stupid baby. His arms tightened around me. And I just cried harder, even though snot and cannulas don’t mix. 

If you ask what I cried about in that moment, it was everything leading up to that, really. A catharsis of sorts, I guess. But mostly, I cried about Bruce at last hugging me for the first time since I’d known him. I can’t fully explain why that one thing crushed the levees. Just knowing that all the walls were finally down, and the overwhelming sense of gratitude that came with that knowledge unspooled me from the inside out.

I petered out after a bit, but Bruce didn’t release me, and I didn’t argue. 

“I'm sorry,” I muttered into his shirt, which was soaked by then. 

I felt him shake his head. “Don’t be. I’m the one who made the scene.”

I relaxed into his wet, solid chest for a moment, then also shook my head. “Don’t worry about it.”

It was quiet for a while, the only sound that of the grandfather clock as it ticked the seconds that passed. Somewhere far off, thunder rumbled. 

“Listen. If it means that much to you… I’ll keep up with treatment,” I said, breaking the silence. I scrubbed away tears and snot with my wrist. “I’ll do it.”

Bruce didn’t say anything right away. I could hear his heart beating in his chest. Its tempo, at first a rapid staccato, slowed to a stable downbeat. The sound matched the moving pendulum of the grandfather clock. I suddenly got why people say you can set your heart to certain clocks—my mom was especially fond of that saying, insisting that she could set her own to the clicking of my dad’s watch, which I still keep in a drawer. 

“It’s your decision, Dick,” Bruce said heavily. “I know I don’t have the right to try changing your mind because of my own feelings or because it’s what I think is best.”

I sighed, and leaned in closer. It was probably as good a time as any to try to explain to him how I felt. 

“Bruce, you need to understand. I can’t keep burdening you like this,” I told him. When he started to protest, I withdrew, and raised a hand. “No. Don’t say I haven’t been—I know I have.”

“Okay, but you _aren’t_ burdening me,” he insisted firmly. “I would never call it that. Don’t even think that for one second.” 

“If you say so,” I mumbled, leaning into him again. “Either way… I just can’t _do_ this anymore. I can’t stand putting you through this. I can’t stand putting _any_ of you through this.” I drew in a breath as I remembered thinking about dying with only my horrible roommate for company when I was in the ICU. “And… God. I don’t want to die at the hospital. I’d rather be here, at home.”

When Bruce spoke, his voice was hoarse.

“You can’t really control that, Dick. And… whether you’re at home or not… you need to realize that you’ll have a _lot_ less time,” he said. “You do understand that.”

“Yeah,” I told him. I knew it all too well. “I do. And… I mean, yeah, I’m a little scared, but Bruce, it’s okay. It’s really okay.”

He shook his head. “No, it’s not.”

A buzz broke into the silence, and Bruce swore as he pulled his League communicator from his pocket.

“Not now,” he muttered, giving me a look full of regret. “I’m sorry.”

I sat back, leaning with equal regret into the couch cushions. “It’s all right. Duty calls,” I said. “Wish I could join you.”

“Hospice isn’t coming until tomorrow?”

I shook my head no. “Sorry.”

He cursed again, and silenced the insistent buzzing when he took the call.

“Batman,” he snarled. 

There was a brief silence as he listened, and then, he muted the communicator and swore creatively in Mandarin. I fought to muffle my laughter.

“Oracle hasn’t given you a solution?” he asked. “…Fine. But someone’s going to have to get out here and cover keeping an eye on Nightwing. …It’s a two-man job.”

“Bats, I’ll be fine here,” I promised, trying to wipe at the breathing tube. “You really don’t need to worry about finding me a babysitter or anything.” 

“Roger that,” he said, ignoring me. “…ETA three minutes. Batman out.” He rose. “Raquel’s going to come stay here with you. You sure you’ll be okay?”

I nodded. “You worry too much.”

“I find you and Raquel drunk on the roof again, and I swear—”

I burst out laughing, unable to help myself. I called after him as he turned to leave. “That was _one_ time, Bruce. We were teenagers. You left half a liquor store readily available in the pantry after that Wayne Enterprises New Year’s party…”

“Yeah, yeah,” he muttered, turning the key to the grandfather clock that would open the hidden door that accessed the Bat Cave. “I just didn’t expect to find two apparently well-behaved and trustworthy kids drunk and dancing buck naked on my roof.”

I was crying again, but from laughing now. I wiped at my eyes. “ _Man_ , that was a fun night.”

“For _you_ , maybe,” he grumbled.

“You be careful, okay?” I said, as he disappeared out of sight. I stared at the empty room, and caught myself feeling just as empty inside with him gone.

Raquel arrived within a few minutes of Bruce departing. I had remained on the sofa in the parlor, where I lay watching the clouds accumulate outside. I found I was a little nervous about seeing her—I looked like _shit_ and no amount of _Star Trek_ shirts would fix that. I don’t necessarily get too bent out of shape about my appearance (after a few missions of getting pounded into unrecognizability and pouring blood everywhere you quit worrying about your looks pretty dang quick) but I knew that even the least shallow of us would gasp at seeing me in the condition I was in. I wanted to see my friends, but equally, I didn’t want them to see me, if that makes sense. I had made the critical error of looking in a mirror before leaving the hospital, and if there was any question before as to what was wrong with me, I knew I wouldn’t have been able even to walk through a grocery store without every person in that place knowing full well on first glance that I was really freaking sick. I resembled an ambulatory dead body. My cheekbones were sharp, well-defined blades hovering over my pronounced jawline, my eyes were dull and sunken, the sockets blackened and deep. My skin was drained and sallow, yellowish in places. My hair, scraggly, baby-fine, and wispy, looked like a lightless, pitch-black mop atop my matchstick neck. My collarbones were like handlebars on a bike. Sickened (well, _more_ sickened), I had turned away from the mirror, not wanting to look down at my chest or abdomen as David helped me get dressed.

Still, I gave Raquel a weak smile when, after Alfred let her in, she spied me where I lay on the couch. She conferred with Alfred a moment, then made her way into the parlor. 

“Hey, handsome,” she said, without an ounce of hesitation coming up beside me and wrapping her arms around my shoulders. She planted a kiss on my cheek, and then sat down beside me. “Now just how long did you think you were going to keep blowing off your friends?”

I gazed at her levelly, trying to gauge how she was taking in my terrible appearance. She, herself, looked cute, wearing a filmy, floral top and cut-off denim shorts that showcased her amazing legs. Her short hair was spiked in places and tousled in others. It was hard to believe that we used to date. We settled so naturally into just being pals afterward it was as though the courtship itself happened only in some collective fantasy. Either way, she was (and is) one of my dearest friends, and I relaxed, knowing that, even though I was lonely as hell for Bruce, Babs, Foxy, hell, _everybody_ , I was happy that at least she was finally there.

“…I guess until now?” I said.

She grinned, her beautiful, dark eyes twinkling. “Fair enough.” She produced her smartphone and thumbed through it for a second. “Well, what do you say we make up for lost time, then… _Horrorfest_ is on in about fifteen minutes. Good lineup, too. _Ravenous, Rosemary’s Baby, Cemetery Man_ and _The Devil’s Backbone._ You game?”

I sighed with relief. She and I had always bonded over horror flicks. “Hell, yeah, I’m game.”

The parlor didn’t have a television, and the den felt like an ultramarathon away. But damned if I was going anywhere in the stupid wheelchair in front of Raquel. I knew she had to have gotten the report on the situation, but I didn’t want her to know that just walking was a problem. I stood, and as though mocking me, my legs buckled under my weight and deposited me on my rump atop the couch. Raquel stood, calmly extended her arm, and helped me to my feet.

“Here,” she said, drawing my arm over her shoulders. “Okay. You ready?”

“Sorry about this,” I said as I steadied myself.

She shook her head. “Oh, don’t worry about it. I’ve helped you walk before, you know.”

I expelled a breath. “Ooohhh, yeah. Black Mask. Not easily forgotten.”

“No kidding. I for one was pretty damn sure he hit your femoral. You still got the scar there?”

I smiled a little. “Yes. And don’t forget, he wasn’t even a centimeter off the mark.”

“No, he sure as hell wasn’t. Scared the crap out of me.”

“Scared the crap out of you—I’m the one who had to hobble around on crutches for eight weeks after that.”

“C’est la vie,” she said humorously. “Part of the job, right?”

Walking was a struggle, but I was feeling remarkably more positive about it. That Raquel didn’t speak to me any differently, and approached me in no unusual way, was just an unfathomable relief. I was so afraid everyone would guard their speech around me and that this night spent babysat by Raquel would be an uncomfortable conspiracy of silence, punctuated by awkward attempts at the discussion of safe topics, and furtive stares. But, she simply braced my weight atop her shoulders, and helped me into the den as though not a thing was even remotely awry. Once I made it to the couch, I checked the oxygen tank, saw that I had plenty of time left on it, and leaned into the pillows. Raquel pulled the throw blanket from the back of the sofa and spread it over me, then paused.

“Well, do you want anything?” she asked. “Water, maybe?”

I hated asking her for anything, or expecting her to wait on me in any way, but I was desperately thirsty and too winded to even comprehend sitting up, let alone walking all the way to the kitchen to get a glass of water.

So, I sighed, but nodded.

When she returned, I accepted the glass, but my hand shook to the point that I sloshed water all over myself. Before I could drop the whole thing, she took it, then, cupping the back of my head, lifted the glass to my lips. I tried to protest.

“It’s okay, I’ll get it,” she said, tilting the glass so I could drink. “Trust me, it’s no big deal.”

 _Yes, it is,_ I thought irritably, but I didn’t say this out loud. I thanked her instead.

Watching the movie, I realized I was starting to feel pretty lousy again—my stomach was aching with increasing severity and my limbs were getting that same leaden sensation. My head felt clogged and heavy. Whatever they had me on in the hospital was probably wearing off. I rested my head against the throw pillows on the couch, and tried to channel the sick-feeling. 

Raquel, noticing my discomfort, reached over and grasped my wrist. “Hey. You feeling okay?”

I nodded. “I’ll be fine—I’ve felt worse.”

Her hand found mine. “Okay. Don’t hesitate if you need anything.”

“You’re a good babysitter.”

She smiled. “Dude, I’m not babysitting you.”

I started to feel a little bitter, and couldn’t help myself. “It’s not like you’d be here for any reason other than I need someone to help me lift a fucking glass of water.”

She gazed calmly at me as I slid my fingers from hers. 

“Now, you know that’s not true,” she said evenly.

I sighed, and inwardly kicked myself. “I know. I’m sorry.”

She, again, took my hand, and squeezed gently. “It’s okay.”

Alfred entered the den with the evening dosage of meds and announced that he had dinner ready. Raquel nodded, and again, assisted me into the dining room after I swallowed the gajillion pills. I had to lean on her so heavily she might as well have just carried me. By the time she had helped me into a chair at the table and sat down herself, she was out of breath and sweating. 

“I don’t weigh _that_ much, Raquel,” I joked feebly, letting my forehead drop to the table. “You losing your touch?”

She had already started in on her meal. Looking up, she gave me a bit of a smile, and her cheeks colored. “Ahhh… something like that.” She paused, watching me futz with my food a little. “Are you going to eat?”

I gave a ragged sigh, forced some food into my mouth, and chewed mechanically. Spoon. Bite. Chew. Spoon. Bite. Chew. My stomach picketed every ounce it was coerced into accepting, until I finally gave up, and put my fork down. I couldn’t have touched more than maybe five bites max.

“Dick,” said Raquel, “you should probably try to eat more than that. Bruce gave me a packet to look over before I left the tower. You need the calories.”

“I know,” I said. “Food fights cancer. Too bad food sucks.”

She gave me a sympathetic look. “Just try, okay?”

I looked at that stupid dinner plate, and I realized I was starting to get aggravated. I was feeling nauseated and had to pee. It was probably a better idea to focus more on finding a toilet than on eating.

“I’d rather not,” I said, and pointedly shoved the plate away. 

Raquel, brooking no nonsense, chewed equally pointedly, and pushed the plate back at me. 

“You and Bruce are both the worst patients. If you want to act like you’re four,” she said, “I’ll treat you like you’re four. Eat.”

It wasn’t really like this was a stellar way for her to spend her evening, and I knew she had probably volunteered to be there and hadn’t expected it to be what it really was, so out of gratitude and my best effort to make it easy on her, I did my damnedest to force a little more food into my stomach, even though it cried mutiny with mounting volume. Mid-mango, I had a goddamn nosebleed. I was a little surprised—I hadn’t had one in a while, but then again, I had kicked treatment.

I caught the flow in my palm, and held my hand under my nose. When I reached for a wad of napkins, Raquel leapt to her feet. 

“Okay, hang on—” she said, taking the napkins from me, then forcing my head back and pressing the wadded paper against my nose. “Alfred? Mr. Pennyworth!”

Alfred appeared like some wizard transfigured out of the dust in the air, and, ever prepared, he pulled the napkins away and pressed a bag of ice wrapped in a chilled, wet towel over my face, having dealt with many of my nosebleeds over the past few months, including one seriously nasty posterior apistaxis that landed me in the ER for a night to have my nose cauterized and packed with basal-constrictive agents, and my body pumped full of units and platelets. He assured Raquel that it was anterior and it would pass, and she took hold of the ice bundle, her hand gently supporting my head. Alfred set about wiping up the table. My stomach started hitching, and I reached up to grasp Raquel’s wrist. 

“What is it?” she said.

Before I could reply or pull her hand away, I hurled all over her, and myself—and the ice bag, and table, and floor. 

“Oh, God—” she exclaimed, as Alfred moved to go get more towels. 

I tried to apologize, but broke off as I threw up again, further undoing Alfred’s prior clean-up job. 

She laid a hand on my back, running her palm up and down the length of my spine as I tried to breathe through further dry heaves. “It’s okay,” she said, “it’s okay.” She kept repeating this.

 _No, it’s not,_ I thought, with equal repetition, mirroring Bruce earlier.

I realized I’d lost control of my lower body and somehow gone totally incontinent when the heaves let up. I stared down at the floor as I registered this last, and, dropping my head to the table, I burst into tears. I’d been warned that this kind of thing would probably happen with frequency before I was released from the hospital, but I hadn’t even been home for one night. The fact that it was happening in front of Raquel only made it seem unfathomably worse. I could handle it if it were Bruce. I could handle it if it were Alfred. But Raquel? I cursed and despised the goddamn stupid world for its current state that took Bruce out of the house, leaving me in the position I was in.

“God-fucking-dammit—” I sobbed. Raquel reached for me, and I thrust her arm away.

“Dick,” said Raquel, this time catching my wrists when I tried to ward her off. “Dick _, listen._ It’s okay. _”_ She took my face in both her hands. “It’s okay.”

I couldn’t stand to look at her, and I couldn’t stop crying—the harder I tried to stop, the harder I sobbed. And for as much as I didn’t want to lose it, I lost it pretty spectacularly. My crying button just seemed to get stuck on and the only way to unstick it was to just keep bawling until the tank was empty.

I cursed Darkseid. I cursed Apokalips. I cursed myself. I cursed God. I cursed Bruce. Raquel, all through my outpouring, stroked my back, and just let me make an ass of myself without judging me. 

I tapered off, and my voice grew feeble. I fought with the ventilator, which was getting plugged with blood and mucus. My hands shook, and I gave it up. I lowered my head. “…I’m so tired of this.”

Raquel nodded. “I know you are, baby.”

I tried to pull away, but she drew me close, and even though I was already inhumanly humiliated and hardly in a state to be touched, I surrendered and cried into her shoulder. It occurred to me that I’d been crying an awful lot that day. Alfred entered, hauling a cart of items clearly intended to clean everything up, and that horrible wheelchair. I became incensed and panicked, all at once. With that, my embarrassment would reach extraterrestrial bounds.

“No—I don’t want to do this—” I cried, raising my voice. “ _Please don’t put me in that fucking chair.”_

“Honey, calm down,” said Raquel, passing a hand down my cheek. “Calm down. Look. You’re on total bedrest. And really, there’s no shame in it. It’s _not_ that big a deal—”

I attempted to push her away. “It is _too_ a big fucking deal—I’m _not_ going in it.”

“Dick, stop it.” She caught my hand. “Stop.” 

I, again, tried pulling back, and this time, went with an epic crash to the floor. Raquel dropped down beside me with an alarmed sound.

“God, Dick." She investigated me for injuries, and then laced a hand under my arm. "Okay… up we go…” she said, gently helping me sit up and further looking me over. “Are you hurt?”

“I hate this,” I sobbed pitifully, covering my face with my hands. My entire body ached. “I hate that stupid chair.”

Raquel laid a hand against my face. “Dick, look at me,” she said. “I know you do. But I can’t help you walk all the way to the second floor. And it’s not just because you’re on total bedrest. I have to get you up there in the chair for my own sake. Okay? I can’t walk you upstairs because I’m pregnant and tired as hell.”

I just cried harder and felt all the worse about my reprehensible behavior. I think I sobbed “I’m sorry,” at least ten times. Raquel just shook her head, and ran her hand over my hair.

“It’s okay, it’s fine,” she assured me. “It’s no big deal. Look, I can’t even sneeze without peeing myself these days.”

This coaxed the tiniest smile, for the tiniest second, through my tears from me, and, even though I was covered in all manner of substances unspeakable, I grudgingly let Raquel boost me into the chair, and wheel me up the ramp to the second floor. However, my sobs started anew and with greater violence when I remembered that Bruce had that same ramp installed for Babs’ sake, and I desperately missed her in that moment. Raquel braked the chair in my bathroom, and set to drawing me a bath. _God,_ I wanted my mom.

I cried and shook and missed my parents and wished I’d died from the typhlitis as Raquel rooted through the linen closet, then poured some nice-smelling sundry under the tap.

“Yep, see that? I’m cheering you up with bubbles…” she said. “And _don’t_ say anything. I don’t care how old you are— _everyone_ likes bubbles.”

I chuckled a little, calming a bit as my nose finally stopped bleeding. Raquel wordlessly helped me peel all of my ruined clothes off, and my sobs just got booted right back up at this next brand of humiliation. It’s not like Raquel hadn’t seen me naked before (again, we were a Thing there for a while; plus, she has my V-card), but I’d been in damn good shape back then and sure as hell wasn’t covered in every possible body fluid the last time she’d yanked my jeans off. Now, my arms were two spindly needles and my legs sprouted like pale gray grass shoots from beneath my jutting hip bones. My waist was like a soda straw, all narrow and cylindrical. Except that my swollen belly was still all grossly distended over that same thin waist, my entire body looked like some bombed-out wasteland. The angry, red puncture mark and mottled discoloration across my chest were the ugly reminders of the PICC line, the tape-bandaged, half-bloody spot on my bulging stomach marked where the G-tube had been while I was in the hospital, and my arms were bruised black and blue from all of the IVs and needles I’d been stuck with.

Raquel made no mention of it, just helped me into the bathtub, and as I hunched over my pale, wasted legs in the water and let the tears continue, she silently and efficiently got me cleaned up. The rinse of hot water over my face and down my back was soothing, and gradually helped me settle. The sobbing ebbed to crying, then to hiccups, then to just a remaining sense of feeling utterly drained. 

Raquel ran a hand up and down down my back, whispering nice, calming things as she did so. I leaned into her touch, issuing a little sigh of gratitude and relief as she gently worked her fingers into my tense, tired, painful shoulders. When Alfred entered the bathroom, they both helped me get out of the tub, dried off, and into a pair of sweatpants and a shirt. Raquel looped the cannula over my ears and pressed the prongs into my nostrils, then got me loaded into the now spotless wheelchair.

“Say, uh… do you have a shirt I can borrow?” she asked, looking down at her ruined, spattered top.

I felt—again—like dying of mortification. “Yeah—top drawer there.” My voice wheezed like a puff of dry, dead air.

She set to, and pulled an old shirt from when I was a pre-teen out of the drawer. She turned her back and switched threads.

“Well, _Rosemary’s Baby_ should be on by now,” she said, all business, checking the screen of her smartphone and then pocketing it. She wheeled me out of the room. “Let’s go watch it, huh?”

I grasped her hand, and looked up at her.

“Raquel,” I said. I could barely squeak a whisper out of my aching throat. “Please don’t say anything about this to Bruce, okay?”

She looked quizzically down at me, but she nodded. “Okay, I won’t.” She began the journey down to the first floor. “But… Dick, you know Bruce, he's going to press me for a full report. And..." Her voice softened. "Honey, it’s really nothing to be ashamed of. I mean, it’s kind of to be expected, with what you’re still getting over—”

“That’s not it,” I explained. “He’s having a hard enough time with this already. He’s got enough to deal with about this as it is, and he just really doesn’t need to know I’m over here shitting myself and having nervous breakdowns and all that crap.”

Raquel pushed the chair, her steps slowing a little. “All right.”

Full of more self-loathing and humiliation than ever in that moment, I decided to change the subject. “So I know I’m a little behind, and I’m really sorry I didn’t say it earlier, but… congratulations, by the way.”

“Oh. Thanks,” she laughed. “I, uh… haven’t been sharing that with too many people quite yet. I’m not even twelve weeks along.”

“Well, I'm glad you told me. It's really nice to hear some _good_ news for once," I said. "When are you due?"

"February," she said. "Man... You know, it _still_ hasn't sunk all the way in yet."

I smiled, and then lit on something, probably belatedly. "So... is that why you were so readily available even though some major crisis is going on in Metropolis?” My throat burned painfully as I tried speaking.

“Yes,” she said with a chuckle, “yes it was. But Dick, I'd have come anyway, you know that.”

“So what’s news on Darkseid?” I asked.

“Hon, you really don’t need to be worrying about that right now, okay?”

I looked over my shoulder at her. “I will so go old, demented man on you and act out with my shit if you don’t spill.”

She pursed her lips. “Little late for that?"

I gave her a half-smile, and in return, she grinned and gave me a light, affectionate clip on the back of my head. I found I was feeling marginally better.

"All right, funny guy," she said. "According to a snitch, his forces are set to invade on the thirteenth. The League is on high-alert and the Light’s actually been kind of the same. Hopefully we can score them as temporary allies, but who knows.”

I heaved a sigh. “And… I’m stuck here.”

“Tell me about it.”

We had reached the den by this time, and she set to helping me get from the chair to the couch. Although I was still deathly embarrassed, all hiding behind goofing around aside, this feeling was quickly displaced by guilt. Raquel didn’t need to be hauling me around any more than she needed to be out on the field. She _looked_ tired, and I understood that pregnancy came with a host of complaints all by itself. 

She sat down on the couch, and she extended an arm to me. Gratefully, I lay down, bone-deep exhausted, on her lap. I realized that I rested inches from the life in her belly, which, somehow, was strangely comforting. 

“Sorry about everything, Raquel,” I mumbled. 

“Dick, like I said,” she told me gently, “don’t worry about it. It’s okay.”

“This _can’t_ be how you wanted to spend your evening…”

“I have literally nothing in the way of alternatives except to watch _Horrorfest_ with my husband, who, by the way, is the biggest wimp ever. _Not_ a good horror movie partner.”

I smiled. “…Thank you.”

She stroked my hair. “Any time, honey.” 

Unable to keep my eyes open any longer, I drifted off. 

It’s from this point that my memory gets a little fuzzy. I remember only a handful of things in any sort of detail. Bruce took to reading to me when he was home, and, in spite of hospice being around, cared for me in every way possible, including the most indignant of them. It surprised me, but I was thankful. Babs came to the mansion with Foxy, and from that time, neither of them left my side. All that had happened between us before seemed to cease to matter. My teammates—friends—faithfully stuck by me, even through my worst moments. It couldn’t have been easy for them, but they never complained. I could only function in patches; otherwise, I was blinded by the pain that swiftly accelerated from an ache to an absolutely overpowering off-button. Everything came in flashes: Function- _pain-_ function- _pain_ -function- _pain._ So even though I keenly wanted to avoid narcotic stupors, I couldn’t resist them forever, and I caved in before long. 

Much as I had with David in the ICU, I had a hospice nurse I liked best—ironically, her name was Robin. She was one of those that managed to be caring without being condescending—much like David. Just as he and I are still friends, Robin and Barb are close to this day. 

And finally, I recall the last lucid conversations that I would have, one with Babs, after I was just swimming up out of the first drug-induced sopor, and the other with Rose, the following day.

I remember seeing Barbara sitting silently in her chair next to my bed, her hand covering mine. Her eyes emptily watched the television set in the corner of my bedroom. Foxy slept in a ball tucked into the crook of my arm. I gave Babs’ hand the best squeeze I could manage. It was weak, but enough. She looked over at me, and smiled. 

“Hey, hero,” she murmured, reaching over to stroke my hair. 

She had taken to calling me “hero” again, her admittedly corny old nickname for me when we were dating. Her customary response to any sort of “I love you” text I sent her was “Love you more, hero.” I had dwelled on this quite a bit, even through the glaze of pain that curtained the days following her arrival at the manor. I wasn’t bothered by her actions, and I wasn’t upset. However, I _was_ a little confused by Babs’ sudden change of heart. She had, apparently, split up with Stephen, and once she Showed Up at my bedside, she had settled into her old habits from when we were dating. Once again, it felt like we had never broken up.

She ran her fingers through my hair, her touch stirring up the memories of all her touches previous, and how much I had missed them. And, gazing up at her, I finally thought I truly understood why she had done what she did. 

“Babs,” I said. I really had a hard time vocalizing by then, and it was agonizing even to me to hear the spectral, dragging hum that was my voice. 

“What is it, hon,” she whispered, smiling her pretty smile. 

“You know when you decided to break things off,” I said, speaking the best I could. M’gann, during the day, normally established psychic links so I could be spared the effort of talking, but she had headed out earlier that evening on Team business, and the link was closed off. I had to make do with the voice I had, however raspy, slowly issued, and slurred it might have been. 

“Dick, I’m so sorry about that,” Babs said quickly. “I just—”

“It’s okay,” I whispered, squeezing her fingers with whatever weak pressure I could apply. “It’s okay. I just… I want you to know… that I-I get it. I understand.”

“What do you mean?”

“I understand why you did it,” I said. 

She shook her head. “Dick, the _real_ reasoning behind it…” She broke off, and sighed. “It was so… just… _selfish._ And stupid, and unfair…”

“It wasn’t,” I assured her. “Babs, I _understand._ I mean… I get it. Like, now… I don’t… want you to change your mind just because of what’s happening to me.” 

“I—” She paused, then lifted my hand to draw it into her lap. “That’s not what it’s like.”

I smiled at her. “That wasn’t what it was like for me, either.”

Her eyes warmed, and she kissed my palm. “Yeah… I know.”

“I love you.”

She smiled, and her eyes watered. “I love you more, hero.”

She leaned down, kissed me, and rested her head against my chest. Foxy stretched and yawned. 

“If something happens, and all this changes,” said Barb, “can we uh… make this… ’nulled? If that’s the opposite of annulled?”

I looked down at her, and she raised her left hand. On her finger, she wore the engagement ring that I hadn’t asked her to return. 

I smiled. For the first time in weeks, I wished I would live. “Deal.”

The following day, I had come a good, uncomfortable way out of the morphine, and was about to request another dose from Nurse Robin when Rose entered my bedroom. She whispered to Barb, who squeezed her hand, then left the room. I was in enough pain that I didn’t pick up on what words were passed between them, but not so much that I couldn’t try to put on as strong a face as I could for Rose.

“Hi, Padawan,” I said as she drew up a chair and sat down. 

She gave me a wan trace of a smile, but didn’t speak for a moment. She looked pale and stressed, her hair tied in messy pig-tails. She wore a white tee-shirt with a grand staff and music notes on it. She reached over and rubbed Foxy’s ears.

“I um…” She paused, and looked up at the ceiling, her single hazel eye wetly catching the light from the window. “I just have some things I want to tell you real quick, okay?”

I nodded. “Okay.”

She gazed at me, her face drawn, and looking somehow more grown-up. 

“Not that it’s any secret,” she said, “but… I think I’m a little in love with you.”

I took her hand in mine, even though my hold was feeble. “I know you do.”

She stared at our hands, finally for-real entwined. Granted, from the time I made it back to the manor and I was finally allowed to have visitors, _everybody_ had held my hand, guys included. Still, Rose’s apple cheeks flushed a deep apricot, and she tightened her fingers in mine. Then, she looked at me, and held my gaze wordlessly. 

“…What am I going to do?” she asked finally, one tear falling, unchecked, down her cheek. 

I had a flashback of the day I first met her, just after Thanksgiving the year before. She had seemed all at once diffident, confident, poised, and uncertain, in her mint green coat and sparkly white scarf that blended in with her platinum hair when she and Deathstroke showed up at my door. I noticed that she matched him, from her white hair to the black eyepatch that covered her left eye. She stood there a little ways behind Slade, who, sharply dressed, eyed me up and down as I stood mutely in my boxers and hooded sweatshirt. Given that he had my identity as leverage, he kind of had me by the balls and I couldn’t exactly refuse to train his daughter, as he asked, standing there on my stoop. I was, he told me, one of the only people ever to legitimately best him in a fight—and he was convinced his daughter was a hopeless case, so maybe I could make something of her, since I was through with the job and all. I agreed, took the money that Slade gave me to cover her expenses, put it away for her to use later, and wound up conferring with Bruce to have her enrolled in Gotham Academy. I secretly signed for an apartment down the hall from mine where she could stay in safety—I frankly didn’t trust Slade, even with his own daughter. He was the son of a bitch that took her eye out and he was openly abusive to her verbally. Even though I barely knew her, it didn’t take long for me to get protective of her, or to figure out that she needed a friend and confidant more than to be trained—Rose was already a perfectly capable fighter. So, aside from training, I opened up a few new doors for her to explore—heroism, service, school, normal teenage life, the Team. Artemis, in particular, took to her, given their similar life experiences. Over time, I learned that Rose loved music, and before Slade had taken her from her mother, she had been accomplished in the guitar and piano. Her father took the instruments from her, as he felt they were frivolous and distracting. I defiantly, and brazenly, took her out to select a guitar, and she, in short order, formed a band with Jaime, Eddie and some kids from G.A. Team members and I often went to the concerts they played at local places. 

I still remember her telling me how much she liked this new life, and had decided to stay, whatever her father might have to say about it. He’d had loudly mixed feelings about her decision. He was furious that she wouldn’t be returning to his side as his partner, but equally, he wouldn’t stand for her to mess up in her Team duties, either. I was kind of astonished he hadn’t come looking for me to give me what-for yet, but I knew that a rumble was brewing, and I felt terrible that I wouldn’t be there for her when the time came for it.

Still, she had flourished, and I knew she could handle herself. 

“You’re going to be fine, Rose,” I said, which was the truth. 

She shook her head. “I don’t know…”

“You don’t need me to show you the ropes anymore,” I told her. “You’ve been doing this without any guidance of mine for a while now, whether you realize it or not. If you ever feel like you need help, or if you have anything you need answered, you go ask Bruce, Barbara, Artemis, M’gann—any of them. They’ll all help you. And please—listen to Tim. I know he gets on your nerves, but he’s trying to _protect_ you. Okay?”

Her brow furrowed, but she nodded. “…Okay. I’ll try.”

“Good. But you have to promise me some other things, okay?”

She gazed expectantly at me, her lower lip drawing in a bit.

“You stay in school, and finish,” I said. “If anything happens, you need to have a back-up plan. So keep up with school and see all of it through to the end, okay?”

She nodded. “Okay.”

“Don’t give up your music.”

“I wouldn’t anyway.” She smiled weakly.

“Good,” I said, squeezing her hand the best I could. 

“Dick,” she said, by now, streaming tears from her one eye. “This is… How am I supposed to handle this? I think about it, and it’s like it’s… just too much. Or something.”

I reached over to her. “Come here.”

She got up, sat down on the edge of the bed, and cuddled down into my chest. My hugs sucked at that point (I generally give suffocating Lawrence Taylor hugs to people), but I managed.

“I know it seems like too much now,” I said. She turned her head to look up at me. Some of her loose hair had gotten mixed up in the tears that coated her cheek. I brushed it behind her ear. “But… it’s just kind of something you figure out how to live with. You wake up every day at first and think, ‘How the hell am I possibly going to deal with this?’ But… eventually, enough time goes by, you wake up and realize, ‘Yeah, it hurts, but I can live with it.’ You just… kind of learn to coexist with it.” I laid a hand on her shoulder, and gave her a bit of a shake. “…It _will_ be okay.” I cracked a smile. “Besides. I’m not _that_ worth grieving over.”

She shook her head. “You’re an idiot. But… Confession. And I have to say it or I’ll never forgive myself.” She took a deep breath. “You-are-so-worth-grieving-over-and-I-still-wish-you-would-be-my-first.”

I chuckled a little. “…I’m sorry, Rose.”

She snorted. “Yeah. Me, too.”

“Let’s suspend reality and pretend I live in the end,” I said. “My position’s going to be the same. What then?”

She held my gaze, then said, “I’d just be so happy you were alive it wouldn’t even matter. Then… I guess I’d start hooking. I _have_ to get laid somehow before I enter adulthood a virgin.”

I started to laugh, but it got lost in an abrupt flux of bone-deep agony. The morphine had officially worn off completely, and after some hours of relief, it was unthinkably more unbearable. Rose sat up.

“Dick? You okay?” 

I couldn’t formulate much in the way of speech outside of a pathetic, “ _Hurts.”_

She ran out of the room, and within a moment, Nurse Robin had entered. I was conscious of gripping Rose’s hand as the nurse put me under the narcotic torpor, then more conscious of how, as I started slipping down under the drug, Rose kissed me. I did my damnedest to stay in the here-and-now, and peered quizzically up at her.

“Had to at least once,” she said. “Sneaky and underhanded, I know. I’m sorry.”

I smiled, whispered, “I forgive you,” and faded out. 

I remember nothing from that point—at least, nothing until I suddenly awoke, and realized that I could _breathe._

I was still tired, still sore, still a little sick-feeling, but nothing like how I felt before I had gone under. Bruce and Zatanna were both at my bedside, and when I spoke, she accosted me with a skeleton-crunching hug, and I, laughing a little at her gusto, hugged her in return. They both commented on how much better I looked, and when I inquired after how the hell I could possibly be feeling so much healthier all of a sudden, Bruce explained that it was an experimental drug that had, apparently, at last done the trick. It seemed outlandish, but I _was_ feeling my strength returning as surely as I was sitting there, so I didn’t question him—at least, not right away. What stands out the most to me in that moment is that Bruce, unhesitatingly, reached over to me and pulled me close to him. Things had altered, and would, apparently, stay that way. 

My life crept back in with an astonishing steadiness from that point—I had an appetite from hell by that first morning, and ate just about everything that lacked a heartbeat (and continued doing so for a few months beyond that first day.) I had enough energy to start some light workouts. Within a week, I was back on the bar, lifting, stretching; two weeks, running and training. As for Darkseid’s invasion, I learned that he had mysteriously disappeared, and his forces, as such, had withdrawn. By the time a month went by, I was back on duty in the Watchtower. My first day back was nice—lots of applause and hugs. It felt good.

I ran the Boston Marathon with Bruce that following spring—the one I qualified for, but figured I wouldn’t be attending—and actually lowered my personal record for that distance, something I didn’t anticipate doing so shortly after recovering. 

Babs agreed that I should still accompany Artemis to Karen and Mal’s wedding. So we went together, met up with Babs, and had an absolute blast, although if I’m being totally honest, I kind of don’t remember a lot of it. All the pictures reveal that Babs, Artemis and I were completely hammered and partying hard that night. Either way, from what I do recall, it was a great time.

Barb, three years after her injury, was given a series of experimental treatments that fully restored her mobility. I was incommunicably grateful to witness this event. It took her some time to coax her muscles out of their semi-atrophied state, then into motion, then into carrying her weight, but once she was up and moving, she was back on her feet as Batgirl in no time. We were re-engaged, but never bothered to set a date. We’re still not married, but not in a hurry, either. It’s common-law at this point, anyway.

Life seemed different in the years that followed. It was good, but it was _weird_ , too. Like… so much of it just wasn’t meant to be, or that my life was somehow out-of-place in my surroundings. And, it sounds abominably corny, but it’s true that, however strange and amiss my current existence feels at times, a day hasn’t seemed to go by that I’ve failed to notice even the smallest things—the taste of coffee, the pleasure inherent in nice weather, the endorphin rush following a mission or even just a workout, the hangover of joy after time spent with friends, the quiet, restful peace of lazy, snowy mornings. My relationship with Bruce has been very different than it was pre-cancer. Bruce was never one to be open with his emotions, and he certainly never seemed particularly interested in his life as Bruce Wayne over his life as the Batman. However, following my strange and sudden recovery, he didn’t shy away anymore when I reached out to hug him, and he wasn’t as guarded about his feelings as he once had been. He acknowledged, and acted on, the fact that sometimes, Dick needed Bruce more than Nightwing needed Batman—and he also finally accepted the reverse. With my dad being gone, I had always felt that I at least had a _father_ in Bruce—but now, I at last felt I had a _dad,_ too. 

So many blessings. Undeserved. Out of place.

Standing on the pier, I’m finally starting to get truly chilled, and I heave a sigh into the frigid air. 

Since the cancer, I’m not afraid to die. I think a part of me, beforehand, was always at least a little apprehensive about it—all the uncertainties that come with the idea of death and all that. However, the two biggies that freak people out about dying, i.e. “Will it hurt,” and “What next,” have already been answered for me, and I know that, in my case, it’s nothing to be afraid of.

What I am not interested in is prolongedly reliving cancer. Some advances have been made since I was sick, so if I were to relapse now (which, I now know, I won’t, but hypothetically speaking), I might have a better chance at living, and living due to much more comfortable treatment than what I endured back then. Still, I’ll quote Rose, and tell you what we all know: Cancer is such an asshole. If I were to have my druthers, I’d never live with it again.

However, the idea that Bruce faces dismissal from the League, and possibly being forced to shed the mantle of the Batman altogether as well, if his hand in the upcoming crisis with the Amazons and Sidhe is discovered is a medicine that I can’t swallow. I would rather swallow the sticky, disgusting lactulose again than the pill of seeing Bruce punished for putting everything on the line to safeguard my life—something he did, by his own admission, out of love. I can’t see him forced into living the façade of Bruce Wayne forever. That would kill him more surely than a life as the Batman ever would. 

Honestly, I just can’t stand for it. I can’t let him tank. 

And I sure as hell can’t let Zatanna do the same. The idea that she would give her life for mine in a spell of healing—well, the mind certainly reels, I’ll leave it at that. She took our break-up a bazillion years ago seemingly in her stride, but now, I’m really wondering. That she’ll also be punished for something she did, like Bruce, out of love… I just can’t stand for it. 

Worse yet, the Amazons have no interest in preserving the lives of men. Sure, they are more than happy to live and let live, so long as our paths never cross. But if Bruce (or Zatanna, her beneficial sex aside) are found harboring Mab, they won’t hesitate to strike them down, or to attempt deadly force if any members of the Justice League follow their example and give Mab a chance to speak for herself. That my own failure approaching thirteen years ago to follow up on my health, which let’s be honest with each other, I knew damn well was failing, could leave a string of dead innocents in its aftershock leaves nothing short of the feeling that all of that blood would be on my hands.

Still, I have no clue as to how I can possibly prevent this upcoming conflict between the Amazons and the Sidhe. It’s impossible even to consider encroaching on Amazon territory—odds are I’d get my head sliced off with some kind of messed up, enchanted Greek machete. Possibly I could try Titania, even though the earthly side of the conflict stems from Amazon. 

I mull over a thousand scenarios in my head, each one as ludicrous as the next, and every one intended to gloss over the single possibility that stands out the most starkly in my head as the only one that will prevent any of these disaster sketches that keep playing out like a looping reel in my mind. The trouble is, I’m not sure how I feel about this single possibility.

I’m about to call Diana to see about gathering her and the estranged Sidhe sisters together to discuss this same possibility when a loud, and rapidly escalating, bubbling sound fills the air. It starts off quietly at first, making me look around, wondering at the source, and then, within seconds, it’s grown to an eardrum-shattering volume. I wince against it, and look out at the water.

To my shock and horror, it appears as though a rift in the sky has appeared, and beneath this same, strange rift, the water roils and teems like a churning stomach. I squint, wondering what the hell’s going on. 

Then, with a spectacular cry and epic splash into the water below, a behemoth, three-headed, canine-looking _beast_ spills from the rift overhead, and rapidly cuts a swath toward the shore, not a hundred feet from where I stand on the pier. I’ve seen plenty of weird shit in my day, so I only gape for a breath, registering the sight.

It can be none other than Cerberus—this I’m fairly certain of. Enormous, lupine, three heads. Please inform me if you have any other ideas. The fur is charcoal-black and shaggy, matted in places, the heads broad at their skulls with long, narrow muzzles, topped with triangular ears. One head sports a notched, sagging ear. How he got that, I can’t say—but I don’t particularly want to see the loser from that apparent fight.

I watch from my vanguard, my hand on my communicator. The three heads, moving in perfect synchronization, lower, and a reverberating snuffling sound ripples through the earth. 

A hound. Searching for Mab.

My communicator buzzes, and I answer.

“Nightwing.”

“You are required in the Watchtower,” says Kaldur. “Reports have been pouring in from across the globe about strange packs of black dogs with red eyes roving the countrysides, and even appearing within cities across the world. They look to be supernatural in nature, but none seems to have a clue as to their origin.”

“I might have an idea,” I state, recalling reading about the Erlking and the Great Hunt in one of my college classes a lifetime ago. Odds are, these are his hounds—also seeking Mab. 

“How quickly can you arrive?” he inquires.

“ETA five minutes.” 

I end the call, and sprint across the dock to race up the beach in the fastest route to the outpost. Cerberus has already overturned cars not far behind me, and I wonder if I ought to hang around and try to get rid of him before I head to the Watchtower. Asking Kaldur, he tells me to get briefed first. 

Fair enough. Mostly, there’s panic, but I haven’t heard anything to indicate bodily harm done to civilians by the monstrous Cerberus. I reach the outpost, suit up, and Zeta to the Watchtower. 

I squeeze Batgirl’s shoulder as I pass her where she works, then step up beside Batman, who stands tense as an old oak, his back set into a square, unmoving slab.

“Hey,” I say, my voice down.

He nods, but doesn’t look in my direction.

“So I’ve had some time to think,” I tell him.

“Mm-hmm.”

“I know why you did what you did,” I say. “I just want you to know, I’m not going to let you tank over it.”

“I knew the consequences going in.”

“Yeah, well. I don’t care if you knew or accepted them or not. I’m not accepting them for you, or Zatanna. I’ll get you out of this. I don’t know how, and I don’t know when. But I will.”

“It’s not your responsibility.”

“Fuck you,” I snap. “Accept some _help_ for once in your life.”

“I did already. Thirteen years ago.”

“Oh, don’t give me that, you old jackass,” I say. “You didn’t do that to help yourself.”

“Yes, I did,” he says evenly. “…Dick. You have to understand. …It was something I couldn’t bear..”

“If you had to go back there, and face it again,” I say, “what would you do?”

“I should imagine the same thing.”

“Okay.” I’m getting mad by now. “Can I try to convince you otherwise?”

“No.”

“Bat—”

“No.”

I issue a frustrated snarl. _“God.”_

“You don’t understand what _good,_ outside of your own living, came of that, Nightwing,” says Bruce. “That same contract was what ultimately led to Darkseid’s disappearance. Other circumstances led to Mab disposing of him.”

I stare at him. “She took out Darkseid?”

“With ease.”

“…Damn.” This just keeps getting more complicated.

As Kaldur briefs us on the mission, reports of further disaster just keep rolling in. Giant, weapon-wielding, humanoid forms that are, according to accounts, laying waste to entire cities in moments. A spectral, black-cloaked figure, wearing a helmet of stag antlers, riding atop a six-legged horse, and surrounded by more of the phantom, red-eyed dogs who are terrorizing humans. Armor-clad women exploding into homes and buildings in swipes of blades and torrents of arrows. I glance over at Batman. He appears frosty and impassive, but I see his jaw clenching. 

“Nightwing, Red Robin, Red Devil, Ravager, Miss Martian, Superboy, Wolf—you’re Epsilon. Nightwing, you’re in charge. You’ll be headed into Tokyo to deal with these reports of giant humanoids,” says Superman. “Equally, as with all other squads, try to talk them down from this witch hunt or whatever it is—if Amazons or Sidhe are present, try diplomacy first. The Sidhe are known as the Good Folk for a reason, I should imagine, and we have two Amazonian allies already. Surely they’ll be willing to hear us out if we’re able to stop this insanity long enough to permit for an opportunity to talk.”

He continues, and my teammates move to my side, all of us waiting to be deployed. Superman finishes delegations, then shouts the requisite, “Move out.”

The mayhem we encounter upon exiting the Tokyo Zeta Tube is pretty damn scary, to say the least. 

The second I head out of the building housing the Tube, shards and bits of building come sheeting toward me, crashing deafeningly into the ground, slicing through the armored arm of my suit, and sending me into a ducking, safe position. When the others come up behind me, I hold out my hand to stop them until the dust has settled and the noise has quieted. At the first pause, I straighten, and we slowly make our way out of the piled rubble that just about fell atop all of us.

I stand and give myself a breath of a second to take in what I’m seeing.

Buildings are smashed to scraps, scattered all across the twining roads and sidewalks like tossed confetti. Corpses and body parts, strewn like litter, mingle with this confetti to craft a hideous, surrealist image that seems cut out of a demented Dali collection. Overhead the reverberating thrum of helicopters echoes through the wreckage, air-lifting survivors and evacuating them (hopefully) to safety. Vehicles roll through the destruction slowly, bumpily, doing the same. It shouldn’t be long before the League and Team are in on rescue efforts, not to mention the UN. In the midst of the buildings still exploding into dust are three colossal bad dreams, brought to life and rendered autonomous. 

These humanoids are positively _enormous_ things, towering at far taller than any of the skyscrapers of the city and indiscriminately kicking buildings and to our collective, unspeaking horror _people_ —apparently humans and Amazons alike—as a child might angrily kick at toys or bugs (with similar results.) Their bulging, musclebound arms swing varying weapons and disintegrate edifices into shrapnel.

To my right, is an image I do not want to see. I do not turn my head. I do not focus. 

A small, unmoving, blood-soaked form, curled around something furry and equally dead. 

I shove this into the farthest reaches of my mind, that deserted, wide-sweeping, plains-like area, where I will deal with it later. For now, there’s a job to do.

An ear-splitting voice rings out, sending a tremor through the earth like a wave that rushes over the paved earth all around us, cracking and destroying the ground in its wake. We are, to an individual, hurled nearly twenty feet into the air when we are reached by this gargantuan ripple. M’gann, gaining her bearings, extends both arms to halt our violent, dizzying ascent with her telekinesis. She lowers us slowly to the ground, where we converge to regroup.

I start bellowing leaderly things on the fly.

“Okay. Miss M. Link us up.”

She touches two fingers to her temple. “Link established.”

I speak through the link. “These things have to have a weakness. Think—we’re dealing with Amazons, right? Are these the Titan gods?”

“Looks that way,” says Eddie, “you can tell by the light bursting from that one, there—Hyperion I’m guessing, and the other two might be Cronus and Atlas. See that third one’s scars all across his shoulders? Still carrying the proverbial weight of the world, apparently.”

“Well, thank goodness there’s a mythology geek on this squad,” I say. “All right, then, Red—weaknesses? Other than the Sidhe, which haven’t been mentioned in their history.”

“Well, I expect the Amazons don’t really want to go down in history as being beholden to them, so they pinned the victory on the Olympians. None of them seems to mind.”

A building literally goes sailing over our heads, sending us crouching against the flying debris, and when that’s passed, I look over at Eddie.

“…Debatable. Not sure about a strategy here—I’m not overly familiar with what we’re dealing with. I’m guessing if Zeus fought against them we’ll need to rely on Superboy, Miss M. and Red as our heavy hitters. The rest of us will set you guys up, and then back you up. Let’s split into teams—I’ll head over to that… _glowing_ Titan with Miss M. and Ravager, Superboy, you take Wolf, R.R. and Red and head off that one with the scarred shoulders. The goal is to lead them as far away from this area as we can—if that means into the water, that means into the water. We need to get them away from the city. We’ll have to figure out a strategy to see about taking out two or more at once, but let’s test the waters first. Move out.”

We sprint over in the direction of glowing giant, who is upturning buildings and digging into the ground with alarming speed. What his end goal is, I’m not sure. It doesn’t appear that he’s seeking anything—rather, it looks as though he’s specifically just wreaking havoc on his surroundings.

Japan doesn’t have an official military. It’s more of an officialized guard, and they’re working from a point in the distance to fire on the Titans. According to the radio blurbs I’ve kept going in my ear piece, fed by the connection in the computer I carry on my arm, foreign aid is on its way in the form of ground forces and air strikes. Better move quick and get the hell out of the way.

“Air strikes impending, E.T.A. 10 minutes. Let’s pick up the pace, Mrs. Butterworths,” I say, and Miss Martian zooms off as Rose and I get moving on our speed lines. 

“Okay—Ravager, you and I are going to hook speedlines into this guy’s shoulders. I’ll take the left, you take the right. Odds are he won’t even notice that they’re hooked up to him—here’s hoping the hooks pierce the skin. Once you hit the end of the line, stick some Plastique to him and break right. I’ll rendezvous with you at ground level and we’ll blow those joints at the same time. Got it?”

“Roger that, Master Yoda!”

“Miss M.—camo up and see if you can get inside his head. I don’t necessarily want you frying his brain, but just see if you can get in and mess around a bit. But whatever happens— _don’t_ let him see you. And that goes for all of us. Think like guerrillas—in, out, gone.”

Miss Martian nods, and pulls her hood up over her head.

“Let’s do this,” I say.

With that, we set to. The speedline hooks attach to the shoulders without issue, and with a glance, Rose and I shoot up toward the massive shoulders, football-sized mounds of Plastique at the ready. Just a teaspoon of that stuff will send a building sky-high. 

I light on the shoulder, mash the putty down with fast-moving hands, yank the speedline free, and twist off to send a speedline off to the right. As Rose yanks her hook, the line, deeply embedded, sticks, and the enormous head of the monster begins to turn. I snatch her up as she cuts her line, and I hook us up to a building some fifty yards off. 

“Thanks,” she hisses in my ear as we zip through the air.

“Don’t thank me yet,” I say, turning my head.

As I fear, the Titan is onto us, and with an air of irritation, pinches the line between his behemoth thumb and forefinger.

“…Ooooohhhhh shit,” Rose and I both say, in unison. Couldn’t have done it better if we’d planned it.

With a feeling similar to being hurled to the side in the seat of a roller coaster, the Titan lobs us away.

I don’t know how fast we’re moving—fast enough that bashing our heads together leads to ringing in the ears, a spray of blood from an undetermined source, and chipping in my back teeth as my jaw slams shut and open. I gather my wits the best I can and fight the G-force to pull the line back up to my side. The first building that comes hurtling into view, I shoot the line out to it, curl up around Rose, and we burst through the window of the building in a shower of glass, wood, and bleeding injuries. Before I can think of anything else, I click the detonator—and hear the distant boom of the putty as it explodes. The stuff has a five-mile radius and we’re not _that_ far off, however hard the guy chucked us. Rose follows suit. Another boom.

“Miss M.—you okay?” I try through the psychic link.

“Oh, thank goodness. Yes, I’m fine. I couldn’t get inside his head—his consciousness operates on a different plane, that my telepathy can’t reach. Where are you?”

“Uh… hold that thought…”

I stand, and look around. Some office building, evidenced by the desks and computers. No one’s inside. Hopefully, if anyone was in here, they were evacuated with success.

“Some office building. My Japanese is a little rusty—that… and uh, there aren’t really any street signs still standing so I don’t think I could read where I am even if I felt like it. By the looks of it we’re…” I glance out the window, and see the glowing giant, just a little less than a half-mile off by my estimation. “Maybe half a mile off to the east of you.”

“Listen. The putty explosions didn’t seem to have much effect on this Titan other than to annoy him,” says M’gann. “I’ve tried stalling his progress with my telekinesis, but it barely even slows him down. We’re all out-classed by these things.”

“Okay.” I send her a mental image of where we were thrown and where we presently are. “We need to regroup. Can you get to us?”

“Yes. Be right there.”

“Be careful.”

“You too.”

I reach down and help Rose to her feet. 

“You okay?” I ask. 

“Yes, I’m all good,” she says. “Shit, that happened really fast.”

“Yeah, sure did.” I give her a hug, relieved that she’s okay, and we wait for M’gann. “I think we’re kind of out of our depth, here…”

“Yeah, well,” she says. “Tell that to Darkseid.”

I smile. “Damn straight. Out-classed? We’ll take them out anyway. It’s what we do.”

A short period goes by, and a rippling in the air indicates M’gann’s presence. She de-camouflages, and immediately glomps both of us in a moment of collective relief. 

“Okay,” I say. “We need to see if we can discern some weaknesses. Let’s get on the ground and follow for a minute. I’m not sure why they’re just busting up the city and killing people and just generally kind of acting like Godzilla, but there’s something here that we’re missing.”

This is heavy-handed even for the Amazons, and that one simple point aside, these giants are attacking them, as well. Not exactly normal behavior among allies. But it doesn’t fit the Sidhe’s apparent M.O., either. So far as the feed continually streaming through my headpiece has said, the spectral dogs and antler-wearing rider haven’t actually harmed anyone—they’re mostly just scaring people.

 _So whose side are the Titans on?_ I wonder. _Mab’s? That seems a little far-fetched…_

We wind up on the ground, brought there quickly and safely by M’gann, and after I nab a mostly undamaged motor bike and hotwire it, Rose and I take that over the streets, with M’gann flying alongside. It’s a disturbing enterprise—I have to repeatedly swerve to avoid debris, and worse, bodies.

The radio feed from my computer informs me that we’ve lost Shayera and Roy. I grit my teeth, and continue. Then, I receive information that we’ve lost Bart.

Then Dinah.

Then Garfield.

I don’t tell M’gann.

We come upon a group of Amazonian archers, who turn and hold out arms to stay our progress. I dump the cycle, and we drop down beside them. They gesture toward the monsters. 

“You do not wish to get too close to them,” whispers one of the Amazons. “Too close, and your fate is sealed.”

“What’s the big deal?” asks Rose, aloud. “I mean, they take two steps and they’re right here as it is.”

“The big deal is that any closer and you will be smashed to kindling, you fool,” the Amazon hisses, showing her perfect teeth.

“Okay,” I say, lifting a hand as Rose’s mouth opens to retort. “If we can’t get close, do you have any suggestions as to how to fight them?”

The Amazon gives me a dark look. “They are the Titan gods. Our only hope is in the Sidhe. We were born of the Titans—never to surpass them in power. I know you wear a medal of your saint, Christopher. You are familiar with your archangels?”

I wonder how she’s aware of the medal. Looking down, it’s popped out of the neck of my suit. Whoops. I tuck it back in and pause, thinking that I haven’t exactly been a stellar example of The Good Catholic Boy in about ten thousand years. But, that aside, I’m at least comfortable with archangel lore. I nod.

“The High Sidhe are a perfectly capable match against your archangels, who are among the most powerful beings in all universes. As such, only they can hope to oust the Titan gods from this realm,” says the Amazon. “Unless you can summon your St. Christopher or the Archangel Michael.”

“Who brought the Titans here, the Sidhe?” I ask.

“…Not exactly,” says the Amazon.

“Well, then why are the Titan gods here, if you, or the Sidhe, didn’t summon them?” asks M’gann, obviously the question on all of our minds.

“Only Mab could have withdrawn them from the Pit of Tartarus,” says the Amazon. “It was her power that landed them there.”

I shake my head. “Good holy… This just keeps getting more complicated. I’m guessing she summoned them to throw you and her Sidhe brethren off her trail.”

“…Partly. It is my belief—and fear—that she wishes to draw Titania out into the open. There, who knows what fate will befall the High Queen of the Summer Court.”

“If Mab is this powerful, I can’t imagine that Titania isn’t,” I point out.

“They are equal in battle. In the end, it will boil down to luck.”

“Great.”

There’s a lot of yelling and we scatter like the roaches we are compared to these enormous beings when one of the Titans steps just where we were standing seconds before. The force of impact sends us, again, rocketing through the air. This time, we tumble and land in piles of rubble and dirt. Debris flies—huge chunks of it, weighty slabs of concrete and brick and metal and who knows what else. Rolling to avoid the rain of busted-up buildings, I haul myself to my knees when the onslaught ends, and spit grime from my mouth. I don’t even want to think about how much property damage has been done and how much loss of human life there’s been here today.

I hear M’gann screaming through the ringing in my ears. Turning, still disoriented, I see her gaping in horror and bellowing for all she’s worth. I follow her horrified gaze, and freeze.

_No._

Rose.

She moved—but not fast enough. 

Her upper body, unmoving and half-buried in debris, is spattered with blood and muck, one arm outstretched, now limply strung across the shards of metal, plastic, brick, concrete, dirt. Her left eye stares, seeing nothing, her white face and hair sprinkled with red. 

I stand, not breathing. 

Her lower body is hidden by the slab-corner of a building, deeply entrenched in the ground just below her shoulderblades. Off to my left, the Amazon we spoke to is already nocking arrows and letting them fly at the Titan who continues moving along with about as much concern for us as for the destroyed buildings.

_No._

I separate my consciousness from the feeling part of my brain. I can’t mourn now. Not here. There’s work to be done. So I stuff the grisly image of Rose into the same desert plains of Deal With Later that comprise the very back of my mind, and turn to my remaining team members.

_Member. Singular. Fuck._

M’gann is crouched down, curled around himself, her fingers digging into the back of her head. An Amazon is knelt down beside her, trying her best to comfort her.

I stumble over and haul her up.

“On your feet, Miss M.,” I say, my ears still ringing. “Still got work to do.”

“If only the Sidhe can take care of the Titan gods and they’re as powerful as archangels,” says M’gann, wiping at her eyes, “what hope do _we_ have? We need to approach this from another angle, Nightwing. Or we won’t even make a _dent_ in their offensive.”

She’s absolutely right. I pause, and think. The only angle I have to play here is Titania—whom I was going to approach, anyway. I look over at the Titans, where they hurl buildings and crap all over. The air strike is coming any second. 

_So, we can either hero up and fly in weapons blazing and die like brave morons and make absolutely no difference in the fate of the world,_ I think, _or we—I—can stop this before it even starts._

“M’gann,” I say. “Go join up with Superboy. I have to try something. There’s no guarantee it’s going to work, but I _have_ to try it, okay?”

“Dick, you’re bleeding,” she says. “You should—”

“So are you,” I state. “Look, I’ll be fine. You go meet up with the others, okay?”

“What are you doing?” she asks.

“Trying another angle,” I say. “Titania. I’m not sure how much good it’s going to do, but I have to give it a shot, okay?” I lower my voice. “Listen. There’s more going on here than you know.”

She stares at me. “Like what?”

“…A lot. I need to fix it. Someone made a decision a while ago, that led to this, and… I need to—to—”

She tilts her head and her expression grows gentle. “Make things right?”

“Yeah.”

She reaches over, and embraces me. I hug her in return, and cling to her probably a little longer than is necessary. 

“Take care,” I say, backing off. 

She nods, and pulls her hood over her head. “You, too. I’ll cover for you.”

I squeeze both of her hands. “Thank you, M’gann.”

She melts into her surroundings, and I race off toward the Zeta Tube. 

The Titans haven’t reached the building, which is a miracle in and of itself, but it has been damaged, and badly. The only two Tubes that remain are Paris and Tai Pei. In the former, only spectral dogs have been sighted—meaning less destruction. I head through the Tube, and once in Paris, I sprint with all my might and Zeta to the Bat Cave. 

I access Batman’s computers, and bring up every file he ever compiled on the Sidhe and how to contact one of them. According to all information, I need a magic user to open the portal so that I can directly call on Titania herself; however, Zatanna, Aqualad—they’re needed topside. 

But I might be able to contact one of the Little Folk—small fairies that, apparently, are not nearly as powerful as their Sidhe cousins—and possibly convince him or her to bring her/his High Queen a message. And apparently, they’re the type to work for cookies and suchlike. Seems easy enough to be sure, but, on the authority of these readings, the Little Folk can be forgetful, capricious, unconcerned, and wishy-washy. No message delivery guaranteed. 

Still, as mentioned, I can’t be dragging sorely-needed magicians out of the fight. Batman had that option. I don’t.

So… what I apparently need is a plateful of cookies and a hawthorn tree or toadstool ring.

Thankfully, there’s a hawthorn tree in the backyard of Wayne Manor. 

I sprint out of the Bat Cave and into the mansion, skating over the floors until I crash into the kitchen. Alfred, seated at the table in the breakfast nook, keeping an eye on the news and watching the screen of his tablet to keep updated on the status of the League, turns and rises when he sees me. 

“Good Lord, Master Richard,” he says, coming to my side. 

“Alfred, this is going to sound nuts,” I say, “but you have to load me up with some cookies, or cake, pie—something.”

“Sweets, sir?” He gives me a classic Alfred Look, one eyebrow cocked and eyes twinkling.

“I know, you’re thinking I finally flipped my wig inside and out. But I need something of that nature, okay? Just trust me on this.”

“Let me see what we have readily available,” he tells me. 

“I could probably unsuit and run to the store, but time is kind of of the essence here.”

“No need,” says Alfred, turning up a cannister of biscotti. 

On investigation, I find that they’re chocolate chip. Perfect.

“Thanks,” I say, and go flying outside to where the hawthorn tree towers like a gnarled, wooden guardian over the snowy courtyard. The clouds have parted overhead, and the moonlight beams silver ocross the ground. Long shadows from the silent fountain and trees paint a henna tattoo across the garden. 

I fret about Damian and Barbara. I worry about my teammates. I’m afraid for Bruce. However I can’t spend time worrying. And I can’t think about Rose’s mangled, pitiful body, either. 

I bring up the necessary words to conjure up a member of the Little Folk on my holographic computer, and although I don’t understand them (it’s in Fae language, and I spare a moment of gratitude that some helpful nerd spelled it out phonetically for the faery-impaired), I speak them.

I wait for a couple of apprehensive moments. 

Then, at the base of a tree, there’s a shimmering of golden-green light against the white snow and black bark, and upon closer look, I see a tiny, discernibly human-like form in the center of the twinkling.

From the glow comes a small voice, somehow tinny and thin, but musical and pleasant to listen to all the same.

“I have heard the call of mortals!” sings the voice in a joyful tone. 

“Yes, I summoned you,” I say, remembering faery etiquette. “My name is Richard. Can you tell me yours?”

“Flora!”

I nod. “Flora. So… Plants, flowers. Sorry there aren’t any around just now, Flora, but it’s winter—flowers get a little harder to come by.”

“I have never seen the winter! It is so… cold. Beautiful. But… frightening, too.”

“Can be,” I say. “Listen, I need a little favor.”

“What are you offering as payment, kind mortal Richard sir?”

I resist the urge to smile. “Well, I have these.”

I hold out the biscotti, and Flora grows brighter. 

“Generous! You mortals have habits of only proffering one sweet at a time! What is it that you ask of me, sir?” she asks. “I will do whatever it is that you ask for such a magnanimous gift!”

“Could you fetch your High Queen Titania and bring her here?” I ask.

“Ohhh… Well, I fear that she is _frightfully_ busy, what with this business with the Queen of Air and Darkness…”

“Please, tell her I’m trying to arrange a deal that will lay all of this to rest.”

“Oh, very good, sir, very good! I shall! Please, remain here and we shall return in two flicks of a hound’s tail!”

“Hey—” I stop her as her light begins to shimmer. “Don’t forget these.”

I hold the cannister out to her, and she falters.

“But, sir—I cannot accept payment until my end of the deal has been met.”

“That’s not what I heard.”

“Most mortals are not so generous as you. I wish to uphold my end of the bargain. Please, wait here.”

I smile, and nod. “All right. I’ll be here.”

Her glow flickers, and leaves in its vanishing the shadow of the tree. 

It’s cold, and somehow eerie in the garden. I can’t stop seeing Rose. 

On a whim, I connect with Babs over my earpiece.

“Nightwing to Batgirl, you okay?” I murmur.

“Little busy, Former Boy Wonder,” she says, her voice strained. “Hard enough dealing with Greek monsters, but I’ve got His Highness in my party, to boot. Literally _to boot._ As in my boot’s going up his snotty little—”

“Batgirl,” I say, a smile spreading over my face. 

“Sorry. You need something?”

“Just to hear your voice.”

There is a pause.

“Wow. This is not the time for that, but thanks for the romance, always appreciated. Love you, hero, Batgirl out.”

“Love you more. Nightwing out.”

A few more moments spent alone in the garden.

Then, a brighter shimmering, and this time a full-blown opening, full of glittering luminescence, appears. From it, flits the little golden-green light that is Flora, and the tall, blindingly iridescent form of who must be Titania. 

Out of respect, I kneel.

“Ah, so you are Richard,” says Titania, a smile in her voice. “I know of you, young one.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I reply. 

“Some time ago, your soul father came to ask me a favor, one that I denied,” she says. She reaches down, and with a light touch, grasps my elbow and pulls me to my feet. Studying me, she takes my face gently by the jaw, and turns my head this way and that, then appraises me up and down. “And here you are, quite healthy. I gather that Mab was brought in to heal you, after all.”

I nod. “Yes. Which has led to the disaster you see here.”

She smiles sadly. “I warned him.”

“About this?”

“About my sister, Mab.”

I think for a moment.

Mabel.

And try as I might, I realize I just can’t see her as being this heartless, icy creature that so many have painted her out to be since I learned of her true identity. Babs and I, on several occasions, met with Zatanna and Mabel to get together and have dinner, go to concerts, things like that. The fact is that, yeah, Mabel seemed a little unusual (not _weird,_ or awkward, mind you, it wasn’t anything of that nature—she was just… removed, maybe), but also keenly smart, wickedly funny, and just unbelievably warm and sweet. Beautiful—yes, breathtakingly so. Barb even gushed about how gorgeous she was. But Mabel was lovely in a way that distanced her—as though she existed in some realm that was not ours.

“I gather that you have become familiar with Mab,” Titania states. “Your face gives you away.”

“Yeah… I have. And I don’t know, I just… I can’t see her in the same way everyone else seems to.”

Titania’s eyes grow sadder still. “It is a crime, what has been done to Mab. But… it was an unavoidable one. Please, believe me when I tell you that I fought for Mab to remain free, and with us, in the High Court of Summer. The Amazons… they clamored for her _head,_ Richard, unless I banished her. And… we do not fear them, the Amazons, no. However, their numbers exceed ours several thousandfold. The threat of war—”

“You had to take seriously. So… you opted for the lesser of two evils.”

She nods, her face somber. “Time must heal the wounds between my people and the Amazons. Then… Mab and I might reconcile, and she be permitted her freedom. But you must understand, Richard. This time _must_ pass.”

“But thousands of years?”

“Are but months, a few years, to the Sidhe.”

I sigh. “…But you _will_ free her someday?”

“Of course I will. I will not allow her to suffer in isolation and loneliness forever. You must understand, Richard, I love my sister. But… Now is simply not the time, while the Amazons’ memories are fresh, and the wounds still raw. And… Mab’s, as well.”

“All right.” I take a breath. “Queen Titania… Is it possible that you and I could make a deal, right here?”

She smiles. “It is always possible, dear one. What would you ask of me?”

“Mab’s escape is a threat to the safety of your realm, am I understanding this right?”

She nods. “Yes. Yes, it is. And yes, you are.”

“If I can prevent it, her escape, I mean, could that be considered payment for what I ask?”

“Yes, young mortal. I would expect so.”

“Is it… possible that you could project my consciousness back in time? Into my younger body? And… Would you retain this timeline, if you did, and I altered things?”

“It is possible. And as the one to perform the spell, I would, indeed, retain this timeline, after returning to the desired crossroads in time. Which begs the question… At what point in time would you wish to be sent?”

I’ve painstakingly considered this already. 

And it hurt, but I’ve had to mull over every potential paradox involved in being projected back into time. Bart informed me that when he made his decision to travel through time as he did, he had to study every paradox scenario. To prevent a certain occurrence might be the proverbial pebble that creates a few ripples, but doesn’t disrupt the current. However, some circumstances might be the dam that redirects the entire flow—for better, or for worse. In Bart’s case, he could only cross his fingers and hope that his trip back in time would redirect the stream for the better. Who knows, at this point. That future is far off.

However, this future—one of Titans laying waste to the earth, and Amazons cutting a path of dead bodies through civilians as they search for Mab, of tensions rising between the Good Folk and Amazon, spelling a war that would spill over into our realm and destroy it—this isn’t for the better.

So, I’ve thought hard on what I would ask the High Queen of the Sidhe.

For as much as I wish to return to the day that Rose and I attempted our rescue of the League and Team on Apokalips and just blow the cancer issue off the map entirely, let’s face facts. _No_ amount of prior knowledge can circumvent all of the things that can go wrong on such a mission. And I’d get exactly one try to get the mission to unfold sans-glitch and complication—pretty freaking impossible. You know that dude, Mr. Murphy? _He exists._ Trust me. And for as much as I don’t want to endure even a second of being sick like that again, I just can’t bring myself to risk the lives of Rose, Wolf, and Sphere (and the entire League/Team) on a reattempt at what was, in the end, a wildly successful mission against overwhelming odds. To selfishly gamble with trying it over to spare my own sorry ass will, I have no doubt, come right back to bite me on said sorry ass. And if I went back to say, the day after I first got off Apokalips, and sought medical help earlier, I’d still, frankly, be pretty doomed—Cross told me that even if I’d sought attention right away, I’d probably have had a longer period of time to live, sure, but the leukemia alone would, with all likeliness, take me out eventually, even if not in that specific bout with it. 

That aside, to be so self-centered when Bruce and Zatanna were so selfless themselves seems downright _sick_. Sure, we can argue that I shouldn’t just up and go die so that I can honor their courage and not render their sacrifices moot. But again, if that same effort to uphold their selfless endeavors leads to let’s say, Rose getting caught out on that desert with Darkseid for an opponent, radiation suit or no, I just can’t do it. 

The image of her maimed form pops up again, and I grit my teeth. It’s a gamble, to be sure, redoing the mission on Apokalips. A lot to gain, yes, but a hell of a lot more to lose. If I lost Rose, as I did barely earlier this evening, or had to explain to Connor that anything had happened to Wolf or Sphere, or fail to rescue the League and Team and doom the earth, there’s no way in hell, or on earth, or in heaven, or anywhere else I could go on after I just selfishly got my companions killed and singlehandedly contributed to an earthly cataclysm. 

It remains a mystery as to how any of the Justice Leaguers were captured—although it was suspected that Psimon and Klarion might have had a hand in the incident. With only one try to unravel this mystery and avert the capture, and possibly forcing Darkseid into stronger action through any preventative attempts, it, again, isn’t worth it. The risks outweigh the ends. Same with trying to preserve Barbara’s mobility. If the shot is altered, it could kill her instead.

Any farther back, and we’re looking at even riskier paradox issues.

Say we have Titania project me all the way back to just before Wally disappeared to try to circumvent his death while I’m at it. If he hadn’t died, I wouldn’t have taken the critical leave of absence that led to my acquiring Rose as my student, and which also left me safe from being targeted by Darkseid, and, therefore, available to rescue the League and Team upon their capture—with indispensable assistance from my protégé.

Losing my mom and dad was an almost insurmountable grief. But if I went back to a point that I could maybe try to prevent that, because hey, we’re discussing time travel here, why not entertain all possibilities—I would, with all likelihood, never become Robin. There’s no way in hell my mother would stand for me to get sent into a crackhouse/mob den armed with a couple of batons and some smoke grenades at the vastly mature age of nine. I don’t even think Bruce would stand for it if the extenuating circumstances that mirrored his own hadn’t come into play, as they did. Maybe I could weasel away to live as Robin in my teens, but Jason would have taken on the role by then, and, you know, maybe he would have died in even worse a way than he actually did (hard to top, yes, but it _is_ the Joker—no limits to what that sick shit will do.) Which means that maybe Bruce would go _completely_ apeshit off the handle afterward, and finally break his cardinal no-kill rule. And once that line was crossed, we’d have an even deadlier criminal to contend with.

It’s not to say that any of this will happen—but it _could._

And I don’t know how I know this. But if tensions between the Amazons and the Sidhe mount to exploding into war, regardless of any present mediation attempts on my part, it is my strong feeling that the world, as we know it, will end—and not exactly in a way that spells new beginnings. Already the destruction is nearly irreparable and widespread.

Bruce’s decisions, however motivated by love, have upset all natural balances surrounding my own life in such a way that the consequences are utterly panoptic and shattering. Disproportionate. 

Kaldur mentioned to me once, a long, long time ago, pre-cancer, that healing magics that cost the life of the caster cancel themselves out—a life for a life, willingly given. But a life regained through the use of supernatural means outside of magical healing—no matter how well-motivated—spells widespread disaster. For whatever good fortune might be wished for another, if it in any way risks a loss of equilibrium, a tremendous amount of misfortune will be rained down upon the world in an effort to compensate. His intention in bringing up this information was to discourage us from seeking out Mephistopheles, for example, and making pacts with him, or his ilk, or any other nefarious being to say, reanimate our deceased loved ones or heal the doomed body of a friend. 

Thinking on his words now, and having gone over all of the ramifications of restarting at varying points in time, his words stir up a whole new understanding.

With this understanding, I take a breath, and speak.

First of all, let me just say something. I’ve lived an extremely fulfilling life, before, and after cancer. 

The day I ask for is right at the end of my own cancer battle—a few days before I truly went under, and didn’t come to. Post-talks with Babs and Rose. Pre- _completely_ -dead-to-the-world morphine stupor. I describe it to her, and I explain why.

Titania is silent, and I wonder if she’s perhaps angered, or maybe even disappointed in my decision.

Instead, a long, slow smile, glowing with approval, crosses her face. 

“You will not live, you understand,” she tells me. “Not without Mab’s intervention.”

“I know.”

“You are certain that this is what you would ask of me?”

I nod. “Yes.”

“And you will, as promised, keep these events from occurring?”

“Yes. I’ll keep Bruce from coming to you, or to Mab.”

“If he does come to me, I will equally discourage him from seeking Mab, now that I recognize my own naivete in sending him her way. Remember, though, there are consequences if you should fail to uphold your end of the bargain.”

“I understand.”

“Very well, then.”

“Also—I just thought of something. Darkseid. Our battle with his forces was won because Mab disposed of him. If that’s struck from history, it could be disastrous, and not just for the earth, but for you, too. If he learns of your realm, I guarantee he’ll try to move in on it, and take it by force. Is it… _possible_ that I could tie his same disappearance into our bargain? I mean, can you dispose of him?”

“Of course, Richard, if he is so dangerous as you indicate. Now…”

“Wait—one second. I’m sorry. But… I _have_ to ask.”

She tilts her head.

“I just need to know…” I say. “Those I’ll leave behind. Barbara, Bruce, Rose. Damian. The others. Will they be all right?” 

She smiles at me. “I do not know, Richard. Do you feel that an unknown future for them is worth the disbanding of this reality?”

Again, the image of Rose, her one eye staring blankly into space, her skin doused with blood.

I’m not stupid. I know the job will probably get her someday. And I could go back and gamble on her future and possibly preserve mine while I’m at it, blah blah blah. But some certainties trump coinciding uncertainties—and vice-versa.

“…Yes,” I say. “Absolutely. Yes.”

“Very well, then,” says Titania. She leans down, and kisses my forehead. “The deal is struck.”

Then, with a suddenness, a feeling of weightless microgravity. It’s painless, but _loud—_ somehow as though a train is split up the middle and rushing by on either side of me. I close my eyes and grind my teeth against the roar, struggling to keep it together against the feeling that my body is about to separate and fly to bits. 

Then—silence.

I jerk awake, soaked in sweat. 

Within a second of waking, I know where I am. Exactly where I asked to be.

Everything hurts. Oh, my _God,_ everything hurts. I suck in a breath, hold it, count to ten, slowly release, take in another. I’ve never forgotten how badly this hurt, but it’s been a while. It’s hard to believe I’m back inside this body.

“Hey, bad dream?” 

The oxygen tickles its way into my nostrils, keeping the feeling of being famished for air at bay, but my heart pounds and shoots a feeling of weakness through my limbs, as though I’ve just put in a series of sprints, simply from the act of turning my head in the direction of the voice. 

Nurse Robin. My favorite hospice nurse. Barbara’s close friend, well, soon-to-be close friend. It occurs to me that this is now present tense again. I’m glad I picked a day that she’s on duty.

“Bad dream… uh, kind of,” I say. “…Didn’t feel like a dream, though.”

“Ahhhh, it’s that morphine,” says Robin, chuckling. “It can have that effect, you know, make your dreams practically lucid. Must be kind of neat, though… Ever try living a prolonged lucid dream? Kind of like a small-scale _Inception?”_

I smile a little. “Maybe I should…”

She smiles in return. “How are you feeling today?”

The truth—absolutely terrible. I’m in that godawful _pain-_ function- _pain_ -function- _holy God PAIN_ phase. I try to concentrate on my breathing, and just can’t. It hurts just to try inhaling. The slow, even breaths necessary for meditative breathing are a thing of the distant past.

“Umm,” I say. “I’m good.” 

She looks down at me, obviously not buying it, and runs a hand over my arm. “Awww, honey. Are you in any pain?”

“…Nah, I’m fine and dandy.”

She smiles. “Do you want anything?”

“Just… my foster dad. You know where he is?”

“I think he’s still here. Let me go see if I can find him. And I’ll let Barb know you’re up, too, okay?”

I nod. “Thank you. Can you uh… tell her to wait until I’m done talking to Bruce to come in, though? I just… need to talk about something with him in private.”

“Sure.”

I’d _kill_ for some fucking morphine. I mean _kill_ for it. I turn to my side, curling around the agony that is most central in my abdomen, and just try to breathe. 

From the floor below, I hear a little trilling noise, then a thump on the bed. Foxy. She crawls over my back, then sticks her face in mine. 

“Hey, Foxy Lady,” I mutter, touching my nose to hers. She kneads the sheets, then settles down practically on top of my face.

“No stealing the life breath or sucking the souls from hapless humans, cat,” comes the sound of Bruce’s voice. 

He appeared aggravated about the cat when Barb first brought her here, but I notice that he runs a hand over her back before shifting her over a little ways off onto the pillow at my side. I turn to my back, and watch as Bruce draws the desk chair up from its usual perch.

“So,” he says. “Robin says you were asking for me.”

I am in so much pain that I can’t even formulate a way to ease him into this. So, I just sort of blurt everything out.

“Okay, Bruce,” I say, “I’m really hurting and I’m having a hell of a time articulating my thoughts. But I have to tell you something really, really important. Okay? And Zatanna. So, you need to call her up and get her over here.”

He nods. “All right. Just a second.”

He steps out into the hallway, and I lie there, trying to close myself off from the pain the best I can. I don’t register how much time has gone by, or even realize that I’ve been gripping my sheets in my fists until I hear the door creak, and my eyes open.

Bruce enters, followed by Zatanna. He sits on the chair, and she, with a smile, sits on the edge of my bed. She’s always been beautiful—very Madchen Amick circa her _Dream Lover_ days. She looks a little less put together than usual; her hair is still a bit damp, presumably from a shower, and she wears an unusually plain, white, sleeveless tunic. She rests her elbows on her thighs, and lays a hand on my shoulder. I remember when her touch sent live wires of electricity through every one of my nerve endings. My first girlfriend. My first big love. I’ll always love the hell out of her.

I cut to the chase.

“So listen,” I say. “I think… it’s time we have The Talk.”

“The Talk?” asks Bruce.

“Yeah. The Talk. Listen. Whatever happens, no matter how bad this gets, even if it seems like the right thing to do— _don’t_ go through with what you’re thinking of doing—either of you.”

Zatanna glances over at Bruce, who frowns at me. They both obviously think my cheese is sliding off my cracker in my drugged-out last days. 

“Okay. What are you talking about, Dick?” asks Zatanna.

“I know. I know what you’re thinking. You—You’re thinking of… the-the Good Folk, right?”

Bruce’s expression doesn’t change, save a lift of the eyebrows. Guilty-as-charged. Zatanna, however, looks positively blown off the map. 

“Um… What?” she says, again glancing at Bruce. “The Good Folk? …Can someone please bring me up to speed here?”

Okay, apparently Bruce hasn’t brought her into the fold quite yet. Either way, he’s still over there feigning ignorance. I get annoyed.

“I’m not sure what he’s trying to say, Zatanna,” he says. “Maybe—”

“Oh, don’t play dumb,” I snap. Yeah, the discomfort is getting the better of me. “Please just—I’m not in the mood. Listen, Bruce, Zatanna. Regardless of whether either of you knows what the fuck’s up—you guys go to the Sidhe, like you’re thinking, and bad things happen. Like—irrevocably screw up the whole world bad things. I’m _not_ meant to live through this. You can’t change what’s happening. You’ll have—you’ll _all_ have—a price to pay that’s _way_ beyond what my life is worth if you ask the Good Folk for a miracle. So just… let this go. You _have_ to let this go. Okay?”

“I think,” says Bruce, a little guardedly, “that it’s a little early to give up hope.”

“I agree,” Zatanna misguidedly backs him up. “I’ll admit I’m a little confused here, but I’m familiar enough with the Sidhe to know that there might be an option we haven’t explored there.”

“That’s crap. I think we were out of line to hope at all,” I say. _Pain._ “…We knew the prognosis. We did what we could. Just… We’ve fought this, and—”

“You’ve fought this,” Bruce points out.

“Whatever. And now… We’re just… We’re cashed out. We’re at the end of our rope, here.” I sink into the pillows. “Listen… you guys. I’m ready to let go. You both need to do the same.”

Bruce doesn’t say anything for a long, long time. Zatanna looks tense, rolling the fabric of her tunic in her fingers. Occasionally, she takes a breath to speak, then doesn’t.

I just lie still, concentrating on a spot on the ceiling. It blurs in and out of focus, ebbing and flowing with the rushes of agony. 

Finally, Bruce looks dead at me, and his eyes are glassy. 

It occurs to me with a great abruptness that I’ve never seen him cry. 

I knew this would be difficult for him to hear, but at the same time, I don’t know if I’m ready for it. Even after years of greater openness from him, I still don’t know if I’m ready to see him cry. I look back up at the ceiling.

“Bruce—”

“I’ve already told you not to give up,” he says. “You stood by your decision. Okay, that’s fine. You do whatever you want to do. Give up. But _don’t_ tell me—us—to do the same.”

I reach over and grasp his hand. “Do you remember what I said? It’s not giving up. It’s acceptance. That’s all.”

“Some things are beyond acceptance, Dick,” he says. His eyes grow even glassier. Any second and they’ll start watering. Zatanna seems to shrink into herself. It’s difficult for her to see, too.

I fight through a blast of pain. This needs to be said. “But they still happen,” I tell him. “And not everybody gets the options we did. I know that trial would have been expensive, even for you, even with insurance covering a percentage of it. Imagine being an average, middle-class dad. Bruce—we’ve been really blessed in this. So… You can say there are things beyond acceptance. But… you and I both know that’s not fair. You _need_ to accept this—or at least keep moving forward until you feel you can. You _can’t_ go to the Good Folk. You can’t ask Titania, or Mab, for help. It’s only going to end bad for everyone. As in really bad, probably unfixable bad. And—okay, while we’re discussing this, Zatanna, you can’t expect me to just sit here and act like it’s okay for you to perform some spell that will heal me but kill you in the end. Try to understand—I can’t stand for that. You’re a good friend, and I’m thankful. But… Please don’t go through with it.” I pause, and release a breath. “You know I love you, and I always will. So I can’t let you do it. Not for me. I’m sorry.”

Zatanna gapes at me. Her arms go limp at her side. Bruce grips my hand, and looks at me. 

“Dick,” he says, finally losing hold of two tears, “how are you even _aware_ of the fact that I’ve been researching the Sidhe?”

“I haven’t said anything to anyone about considering a Healing Spell, either…” Zatanna says.

I brave the discomfort, and crack a smile. “…Is telling you guys that I had Titania project my future consciousness back to this point in time to warn you of the Armageddon that comes as a byproduct of your decision to implore Mab to heal me too far-fetched to buy?”

Bruce is silent, his eyes less watery. “Not too far-fetched, but… I think we need to check your meds.”

I try to laugh, but the agony stifles the effort. Bruce stands and reaches over. I feel the back of his hand on my forehead. 

“You sure you don’t want another dose?” he asks. 

“Maybe,” I say, “when we’re done talking. But… I need your word on this first. Don’t go to the Sidhe, and while we’re at it, don’t go to a demon, or the devil, or—fucking—Zoltar, either, to make any deals for my sake. I mean it, okay? You do it, and it’s only going to wind up worse than you know. The price they’ll ask you is way too steep and has way too many hidden consequences. Chaos theory. This is it at its finest. Please… trust me. Let go.”

“Dick.”

“ _Please.”_

He stands in silence, then runs his hand over my hair. Zatanna stands up, shakes her head, and exits the room. I reach out to stop her, but she’s off. Bruce watches her as she leaves, then turns his gaze to me.

“Do you understand what you’re asking me?” he says, his voice quiet. 

I catch hold of his wrist. I’m getting emotional myself, by now. “Yes. I do, and I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry. But… do you understand what I’m trying to tell you?”

He pauses, and again, loses hold of two tears. “Yeah. …I think so. I just… don’t want to hear it.”

“You need to,” I say. And yep, I’m crying, too. “Let go.”

He nods, and sinks down on the edge of the bed. I do my best to sit up, and instead of helping me, he abruptly, and painfully, yanks me into a hug. Even though I’m sore and I feel like every ounce of my body will crumble and snap beneath the pressure, I hug him back as hard as I can. He’ll need this, later on. 

“It’ll be okay,” I murmur into his shoulder. 

He draws in a breath, and I feel him shaking. I tighten my hold on him, and repeat myself. “It’ll be okay.”

He exhales. “…Okay.” He breathes in, then out.

I lie back, and he stands, pinching the bridge of his nose, then swipes his thumb and forefinger across his eyes to draw them, again, into a pinch. 

“Whatever happens,” I say, “keep an eye on Zatanna. Don’t let her do it.”

He sighs, nods, and then frowns down at me. “So. What happens in the future that’s so bad?”

“Well… Long story short, you make a deal with Mab, who’s imprisoned for destroying Themascyra and kidnapping Diana—our Diana—a couple thousand or so years ago, which leads to Mab escaping her prison. She then goes to summon the Titan gods from the Pit of Tartarus, and unleashes them on a couple of different places, London, San Francisco, Milan, Tokyo. I personally watched them flatten Tokyo in a matter of minutes. Rose… died in that battle. And… I got reports of losing Bart, Dinah, Roy, Shayera, Gar." Speaking is absolutely exhausting. I take a second, and try to catch my breath before continuing. "Titania summoned the Erlking to find Mab, and the Amazons released Cerberus to do the same. Those last two, they didn’t hurt anyone, so far as I knew, but… they did a hell of a lot of property damage. That’s not even taking into consideration the cities that the Titans destroyed. Even the League’s resources compiled with your own wouldn’t have covered even a tenth of it, Bruce. …Not to mention all the innocent civilians that the Titan gods took out. Sure can’t put a price on that.”

He’s silent, staring at me impassively.

“…I think you had a bad dream,” he says. “It was only your third time on the stuff, you know.”

 _PAIN._ “Bruce—I think you just… need to trust me on this. Please don’t go to Mab, or anyone else. Let go. If for nothing else… for my sake, and because I’m here, asking you to. Please.”

He sits down again, and lays a hand on my shoulder. He focuses on a spot in the corner of the room, and, giving my shoulder a squeeze, he nods. I reach over, and grasp his arm. 

“Bruce…” I say. _PAIN._ “Promise me.”

He doesn’t look my way, but he, again, squeezes my shoulder. “All right, Dick. I promise.”

My voice is tight and strained. “…Thank you.”

One more squeeze of the shoulder, then a pat.

 _Painpainpain._ I give Bruce an imploring look. “…Can you please call Nurse Robin up here now?”

“Of course,” he tells me.

He stands, and heads out of the room. Shortly thereafter, Robin comes through the doorway, with the dose of reprieve. As she administers it, I feel my entire body as it involuntarily relaxes, the relief spreading through my core, my limbs. 

I gaze out of the window, watching the light blur, and fade, taking me with it into that place, that place of slow-moving, watery, narcotic stupor, out of the pain and sick place. 

There’s a part of me that’s not detached, and is still thinking.

I worry about Damian, and what will become of him, if I’m not there to defend him from my teammates (who did not take to him, and made no secret of it) when Batman’s not around. I wonder about Barbara, and what her future holds. I feel some regret that she and I won’t have kids, even though being a dad has never been at the top of my priority list. Babs and I had one Oops that she ended up losing early on. Although it hurt like hell, and we cried and struggled with it afterward, we didn’t exactly rush to try again from that point. Still, not everybody has kids, and that’s okay. I just hope Barb will end up happy, either way. 

I remember thinking these same things right about this time, prior to any Sidhe dealings. But I got to a point where I found I no longer worried, and just let myself drop off. And all I remember experiencing, was a deep, encompassing peace, once I did. I become aware of Babs, who has reentered the room. Her hand rests on mine as she chats with Nurse Robin. 

I know, deep down, that I’ve done the right thing. 

I close my eyes.

_No man is an Island,_

_entire of itself; every man is a piece of the Continent, a part of the main;_

_if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were;_

_any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind;_

_And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;_

_It tolls for thee._

**Author's Note:**

> Don't forget Part 3... :D   
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/2179260


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